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With Original Illusiraiions 



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Clark ^QrocmrJ 

Pujolishers 
Q ismarcIcN.D. 






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Copyright, 1916 

by 

CLARK & CROCKARD 

Bismarck, N. Dak. 




JAN -9 (917 



CU455057 



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^ ffim a senfimenf zind 
(o\^e fKnl ^roWs sv^eeier 
n^m- eack pnisiw^ year. 

in deepe'si reference hAe 

"Jim ^ am junior 






Page 

Preamhle ' H- 

IMother 1^ 

The Little Feller 18 

In the Twilight of Lite 22 

I Lost a Friend 25 

A ^[other's Love - . • • .-^— •- » 29 

The Pleasure of a ^Fan 32 

Thy Faithful Servant 3T 

My Mother -±2 

His Greatest Monument -ifi 

v^ilver Threads "t^* 

His Mother and Old Cxi. u-y 53 

Big- Tim Cashed In •'>*^ 

Somebody's Mother 61 

Billy Rugh 64 

Her Boy Came Back "0 

A Titanic Death ^^^3 

Schumann-Heink's Greatest Role "^'^ 

Life's Shadows 82 

Youth and Love 8 1 

]^Iother. Home and Heaven 91 

Calve's Yearning 94: 

Richard Harding- Davis 98 

The Tie That Binds 102 

O'Xeill's Good Streak lOT 





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PV^ 



^^f HE twenty or more stories comprising this 
/ I volume are selected from the monthly num- 
^^ bers of Jim Jam Jems covering the first 
five years of its existence. These stories 
are based upon fact — names, places and details 
being correct to the best of my knowledge at the 
time each article was written. For the most part 
the stories consist of comment concerning promi- 
nent personages and incidents in real life that have 
come to the notice of the writer. The May num- 
ber of Jim Jam Jems each year is "Mothers' 
Number," and I have included herein some of my 
tributes to Mother and to Mothers' Dav. There is 
naught in this volume but sentiment — the kind of 
sentiment that appeals to the best in manhood and 
womanhood. There have been so many requests 
for back numbers of Jim Jam Jems containing these 
various stories — requests which could not be com- 
plied with because the monthly editions had been 
exhausted, and we could not supply the back num- 
bers — that I have decided to meet tlie demand by 
compiling the stories herein and placing them be- 
fore the public. 

In presenting this "Volley of Sentiment" to the 
reading public, I feel that it is incumbent upon me 
to say that I occupy no ministerial or prelatic posi- 

11 



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— --^ V 





tion in life. I make no claim whatsoever to moral 
merit or to religion. I am simply a man among 
men. If there should come to you anything of 
moral admonition through what is written here, 
it comes not from any sense of moral superiority, 
but from the depth of my experience. 

Society is moving at a rapid pace. We Amer- 
icans are too busy in our daily work, and in the 
pursuit of the pleasure that this electrified century 
has brought about, to devote much time to senti- 
ment. But there is humanity — real humanity — in 
all of us, and while my writing is usually of a 
pungent and perhaps spectacular brand, yet I have 
never allowed the blunt and rough reality of life's 
struggle to deaden my inherent sympathy and senti- 
ment. Thus the day seldom passes that I do not 
stop to take cognizance of the sweeter things in 
life, and occasionally I write a story based on a 
particular incident that has appealed to me because 
of the sentiment it holds. 

In offering this volume to you I have no apology. 
My faith in humanity tells me that it will find a 
responsive chord in your heart, and I believe that 
it will appeal to the best that is in you. 

Jim Jam Junior. 




.12 





^^■jT HE memory of mother does not belong to 
/ 1 the hurly-burly of business life. It be- 
^^^ longs rather to solitude — to the hours man 
spends with self. It belongs to the 
dreamer — for the eyes see sweetest pictures when 
they're shut. The word mother is the tenderest 
word ever framed by celestial lips. The man who 
has known the love of a good mother — I care not 
to what towering heights of business or financial 
or political strength he may have climbed, or to 
what depths of degradation he may have fallen — 
can not hear the w^ord mother without that little 
tingle of something in the blood that springs un- 
bidden from the heart and pulses its way to the 
lips in a sigh. 

The month of May is upon us — the springtime 
of another year — and with it comes "Mothers' 
Day." Thus the May issue of Jim Jam Jems is, 
and ever will be, dedicated to mother. For my 
mother — to me — was the grandest woman who 
ever graced the mighty tide of time, and in pay- 
ing tribute to her memory with a short eulogy 
once each year I am but giving my fellow man just 
a glimpse of the good that my mother instilled 
into my being and implanted in my heart through 
her noble influence and kindly teachings. 



1/ 






33 



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Youth is ever a dreamer, and occasionally, when 
the fleeting years return, to the mature mind of 
man, there is a charm about those dreams that is 
altogether inexpressible. Every boy, in the happy 
springtime of youth, builds great castles in the air, 
with turrets of sapphire and gates of beaten gold. 
You and I, old friend, dreamed away many days 
of our youth on a bed of thornless roses. And 
tliank God, dreams are also the golden heritage of 
man's estate. Though every passing day sap lusty 
strength and every step be weaker than the last, 
the heart wdth its cherished memories and buried 
])ictures of the past is ever young, and the man 
does not live v/hose memory does not at times grope 
falteringly back over the years to where his care- 
less childhood straved. 

It may be a line of poetry, a flower, the note of a 

bird or the strain of an old forgotten tune that 

breaks suddenly upon us — just a simple little 

something that comes unexpectedly and touches 

the spring of sentiment that carries the thoughts 

of the wanderer with league-boots over the years, 

back, back to vouth and mother; and the heart is 

filled with a melody as soft as the note of the 

mocking bird trilling a last goodnight to its mate 

— sweet as the jasmine-bud drunken with its own 
perfume. 

It is just a few weeks ago that I was entering 

14 




j<y 






«// 







the historic city of Belgrade in Serbia on a mil- 
itary train. I was talking with a German officer 
about the campaign in Serbia when he casually 
remarked: "We are now crossing the Danube." 
\\^ould anyone believe that a man of my years, 
hardened with experience and worldliness, should 
find his voice suddenly break with emotion and^^ 
tenderness, while tears rose unbidden to the eye? 
Perhaps it was but a reaction of the excitement 
that had carried me so eagerly into the war zone; 
or was it a sudden realization of loneliness? Any- 
how, I found myself muttering broken fragments 
of that old song", "The Blue Danube." It was my 
mother's favorite. I have heard her sing it in the 
twilight back there in the old home while the even- 
ing shadows gathered and peace and happiness 
filled the heart. There has ever been an invincible 
charm about that old song, and I do not recall ever 
having heard anyone else sing it but my mother. ^\jj 
I found myself trying to gather the fragments and 
shape the w^ords to something- like a tune, but just 
a line or two would come back to me: 

"I oft' since then, have watched the moon, 

But never, love, no never, never. 
Can I forget that night in June — 

Upon the Danube River." 

Just the name "Danube" and the memory of 

15 





that old song carried me back over the years, and 
I repeated those lines over and over again. Some- 
how I could not shake off the spell, and that night 
I found myself wandering along the banks of the 
Danube; a strange tenderness filled my heart and 
a longing and loneliness I have never before exper- 
ienced came over me. Every ripple of the river 
seemed to have my mother's voice in it, while every 
star woven in the silken web of night seemed to 
be the eyes of pitying angels winking back their 
tears. 

Eleven years have passed since I stood at the 
open grave in the little church-yard back home 
and heard the clods of earth rattle on the rough 
box while the Man of God repeated, "Dust to 
Dust, Ashes to Ashes." I was twenty-five years 
old then, fresh from college, and the world seemed 
so easy to conquer! But what charm did success 
hold without mother to share it? I had never held 
a thought for the future without her, and as my 
brother linked his arm in mine and we walked 
toward the waiting rig that was to carry us to the 
old home for the last time, we both seemed to know 
instinctively that here was the parting of the way, 
that the strong link in the chain that had bound 
us to the old home had broken — mother was gone 
— and life" would never be quite the same again. 

Time is a -great surgeon. The deepest wounds 



/^ 



16 



#xi- 'X 







^^ 



".j will heal and the pain will lessen and disappear. 

\i: But a mother's love will live and grow green above 

the ashes of Time and Eternity. It will cling to 

the worthless cad like creeping ivy clings to the 

crumbling wall and hides the ruin there. The 

>^ "^ memory of my mother is the sweetest thing in my 

life and each time that I write a tribute to her 
memory I feel cleaner and bigger and better and 
more worthy of the respect and friendship of my 
fellow man. 

V''\^^ ' f!; I am grateful, indeed, to Anna Jarvais, whose 

splendid womanhood asserted itself in establish- 

' ing a national Mothers' Day. Not that I have 

locked the memory of my mother in my heart and 

recall it just once each year; but Mothers' Day 

gives occasion to those who will to do honor openly 

to every mother, living or dead, and every man is 

better when touched by the sentiment that is 

anchored deep in the heart of humanity for mother. 

And it is with deepest reverence and a sentiment 

that grows sweeter and more cherished with each 

passing year that I dedicate this May number to 
the memory of my mother. 

Jim Jam Jems, May, 1916. 



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®lje little geWev 

N a stretcher in the improvised morgue 
near the Eastland dock in the big city of 
Chicago, lay Nmiiber 396. The Greek 
sculptor, working in marble, could not 
have chiseled a more perfect face, and the shock 
of reddish-brown hair, tossed carelessly about 
the brow by the rushing waters from w^hence the 
body had been rescued, reminded one of a glint 
of morning sunshine on a marble statue. Number 
396 was a lad about ten years of age; his 
only earthly possession was a horn-handled jack 
knife clutched in the rigid right hand; his clothes 
were ragged and his stocking was ''busted" at the 
knee; it was apparent that he belonged to the class 
of little strugglers in a great city, and he had gone 
out on that fateful morning to have some fun — 
probably had sneaked onto the big excursion boat. 
His body was one of the first rescued when the 
overloaded Eastland toppled, and it was laid among 
those hundreds of other unfortunates which formed 
long rows across the spacious floor of the Second 
Regiment Armory. As order came of chaos, the 
bodies of victims were tagged and numbered. That 
is how he came to be known as Number 396. 
Hour after hour and day after day, fathers, moth- 
is 



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ers, brothers, sisters, relatives and friends passed 
along, scanning the ghastly dead faces, identifying 
and carrying away their lo^^od ones. The numbers 
gradually diminished until those remaining had 
dwindled to five — four adults and "The Little 
Feller", as he was called by the big, burly police- 
man who guarded the morgue. 

Days passed. All the others had been identified 
and carried away by their loved ones ; their trinkets 
had been gathered up, and amid flowers and tears 
they had been laid to rest. All save Number 396 
■ — the Little Feller — who lay friendless and alone, 
unclaimed, unmourned, unsung, a pitiable candidate 
for the Potter's Field. It didn't seem right for 
the others to be carried away — that the Little Feller 
should be all alone. Surely someone would come, 
tenderly lift the little body, fold up his clothes and 
lay them away with the crude jack-knife, and give 
him a funeral, and, well — shed a tear. 

Of the thousands and thousands who passed and 
looked into the face of the Little Feller, none seemed 
to know him. Maybe his father and mother were 
in the hull of the death boat or had floated down 
the swift current of the river; maybe he was a 
waif without one person in the world to care; 
maybe he was a runaway from a nearby town. 
No one seemed to know, or care verv much. 





19 



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But the day of awakening was to come in his 
behalf. On the fifth day the newspapers commenced 
to print pathetic httle stories about Number 396 
— the lonely little lad over there in the Armory. 
The battered, bruised and torn hearts of the 
great city were filled to overflowing; the shock of 
that awful tragedy had stunned humanity; it need- 
ed something just like the Little Feller and his 
loneliness to unite the tears of this great city in one 
flood of sympathy. He w^as claimed by the entire 
city. The call went ringing out among the Boy 
Scouts that "Comrade 396" would be buried with, 
full military honors, and the Ijttle Feller was to 
have a funeral. The sorrow and heartaches of 
the great city were focused at last — all hearts had 
found a common ground. Stunned by the horror 
of the Eastland disaster, the pent up sorrow and 
sympathy of a mighty city were loosened at last 
and the bier of the Little Feller was buried 'neath 
a flood of tears and flowers. All Chicago wept for 
this lad who seemed to represent the entire list of 
those who had met death with him. The mayor 
and other prominent personages participated in 
the obsequies and Number 396 had the greatest 
funeral ,of all. 

Thank God for the humanity that is in all of us. 
And all honor to Chicago's citizenship for this act 

20 



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of charitable kindness. He was only a ragged 
little urchin, but he had harmed no one, he had 
deserved no punishment, he had naught in his 
heart but love for all humanity. And humanity 
returned that love with a flood of sympathy. The 
Little Feller — Number 396- — touched the best there 
was in the heart of a great city by his sheer lone- 
liness. 

///;;. Jam Jems, September, 1915. 



M 




21 





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^n the ©wiitght jof gifc 

^'^■T' HEY were just plain folks, these two. We 
/ I saw^ them first in the little restaurant around 
^^^ the corner where we went to get our coffee 
and rolls one morning. Somehow the pic- 
[ture has never faded from our memory, and whileJ^W 
'- we thought not to give space to any sentiment in 
this issue of Jems, we just can't forego the pleasure 
and we know our readers will forgive the drawling 
of a little pen picture of this old couple as they 
•appeared to us in "the twilight of life". 

He was a rather large man of the sturdy farmer 
type, with iron gray grizzly hair; she, a slight little 
woman with wavy white locks done in the old- 
fashioned "pug." Where they came from or 
whither they went we do not know, but w'e can see 
them now as they sat at the little table sipping their 
coffee and talking — probably planning their day 
of shopping and visiting in the city — apparently 
unmindful of the presence of others. When they 
had finished their meal and arose to go, we noted 
the manner in which he drew the big coat about 
her slight form ; how he opened the door for her 
to pass out and then with the grace of a gallant, 
took her arm as the two walked slowly down the 
street. 

We saw them again that evening at the picture- 

22 




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show, and curiously enough, we found more pleas- 
ure in their real enjoyment of the show than we did 
in the entertainment itself. Moving pictures were 
evidently a revelation to them and the timewom 
chatter and songs of the vaudeville team were the 
work of artists so far as this old couple were con- 
cerned. 

Wt fell to wondering how long they had been 
together. Doubtless they were playmates once 
and school-mates later; she a simple country lass 
with gingham frock and sunbonnet — he a freckle- 
faced barefoot lad with a sore toe and an abnormal 
appetite for pie. We could see them wandering 
over the hills together on their way home from 
school; on the hillside they stopped while he held 
the buttercup under her chin and watched the mel- 
low glow; and they gathered the daisies and the 
wood violets while the meadow lark sang his tune- 
ful lay in harmony with their childish happiness. 
In memory we watched them grow^ to the spelling- 
school and husking-bee age; we saw her as she 
found the red-ear and chose him to receive the kiss; 
we saw^ him drive up in the rickety old buggy to 
take her riding on Sunday afternoon, and then 
again when they w^ent to ask her father for her 
hand. We saw them receive the proverbial bless- 
ing, and danced with the others at the wedding; 
and then on the little plot of ground their parents 

23 





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gave them we watched them build their first home. 
That was many, many years ago. Since that time 
their own children have come and gone — have 
grown to manhood and womanhood — and now in 
the twihght of hfe these two are lovers still, lovers 
as in the days of old when she wore pinafores and 
he the torn-brim hat. 

Their lives have been as pure and sweet as God 
would have them be; their joys were always simple 
joys that far outweighed the sorrows, and now 
when the shadows are lightly falling" they are happy 
just with each other. And when the final sum- 
mons come they will meet it — together. 

We do not know where they came from or 
whither they went, for we saw them no more; but 
the picture of their happiness together as we read 
it in their kindly furrowed faces will remain in our 
memory forever, and we are better and happier 
for this meeting on life's highway with these simple 
folk— for this picture from life's sweetest side. 

Jim Jam Jems, March, IQ12. 




-^i^i 




24 



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■.-V 




IS life was gentle, and the elements so 
mix'd in him that Nature might stand 
up before all the world and say, 'This 
was a man'." We sat in the little 
chapel at Lakewood Cemetery, Minneapolis, a few 
days since, while an old-fashioned preacher spoke 
simply and beautifully of our friend whose earthly 
body lay banked in flowers there in front of the 
altar. Through the open windows of the chapel 
came the rustle of autumn leaves that the soughing 
wind was carrying from tree to earth, as though 
Nature were showering the grave of summer with 
the life of yesterday. 

We had come simply to bow our head and sigh 
out the heaviness of our heart at the bier of a 
friend, but as the man of God said, "Peace to his 
ashes," and the tone of the pipe organ vibrated the 
strains of an old hymn, and then the sweet, clear 
voice of a singer rose from somewhere and filled 
the little chapel with the melody of "Lead, Kindly 
Light," a flood of emotion swept o'er us and we 
could not stay the tears. For our friend lay cold 
and dead in the casket there, and we knew that 
this was indeed the parting of the way. 

It was scarce a week before that we had spent 
an evening with this pal and had planned a pil- 



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grimage together to far-off Alaska in quest of big 
game. In the years of our friendship we had 
spent many happy days together in the open; we 
had dimbed the rugged Rockies, sought the haunts 
of the fleetfooted bighorn and the grizzly, hooked 
the gamey mountain trout in hitherto unfished 
streams, and followed the flight of the honker in 
far-ofl' Canada. Many a night had we rolled in a 
blanket beside our camp-fire away ofl: there in the 
wilderness, tired, happy, contented. By day we 
measured our strength against mountains of stone 
or blazed our way through dense forests and when 
the cooling mists of evening fell, and the empurpled 
shadows crept through the great canyons, we 
pitched our camp in "No Man's Land," stretched 
our tired limbs on a bed of balsam boughs and 
slept the sleep that comes only to those who have 
the strength of outdoor life in their veins and the 
love of Nature in their hearts. 

Our friend w^as an ardent lover of Nature. He 
loved the mountains and the streams, the fields and 
the forests. He knew the note of every bird, the 
haunts and habits of wild animals. We have 
watched him work with the zeal and enthusiasm 
of a true artist in the attempt to photograph a 
sunset in the wilderness, a beast in its lair, or a 
mother bird feeding its young. While he had the 
iron of a big game hunter in his veins, he had the 

26 



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tenderness of a wild flower in his heart, and he 
loved the big outdoors with all the strength of a 
man who has lived his life close to Nature. 

Not only in North Dakota where he made his 
home, but to nature-lovers and outdoor men, north, 
east, south and west, throughout the world of 
American sportsmen, Horace Peck w^as known and 
loved. He was a happy-go-lucky fellow, was 
Horace. He chased the sunny side of life with fly- 
ine feet. There are those who will condemn him. 
There are those who believe that his sudden death 
while yet a young man was the reward for a mis- 
directed life. These are they who are dominated 
by the mediaeval creeds. To these we have no 
word to say in regard to our dead friend or his life. 
They are ruled by the skeleton hand of the past and 
fail to see the moral beauty of a character lived 
outside their puritanical ideas. His goodness was 
not of the type that reached its highest manifesta- 
tions in any ceremonial piety ; his goodness, we say, 
was not of that type, but of the type that finds 
expression in the handclasp; the type that finds 
expression in a word of cheer to a discouraged 
brother, in quiet deeds of goodness and charity, in 
friendship — the sweetest flower that blooms along 
the dusty highway of life. His was the helping 
hand to every pilgrim, and the day never passed 
that did not carrv wdth it a sacrifice of comfort 





27 



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in behalf of a fellow-being or a word of cheer or 
a deed of kindness and gentle solicitation for a 
friend. 

Yes, indeed, we lost a friend and pal when 
Horace Peck died. And in all the years to come, 
whether it be tramping the hills and forests, or 
roaming the plains with gun and pack, thoughts of 
those good old days we spent together with rod 
and gun will haunt us until we meet again on the 
unblazed trail 'cross the river Styx where lie the 
happy hunting grounds of eternity. 

Jim Jam Jems, October, igi6. 



A 



28 



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^ piothet'e govs 



"A 



BOVE the cloud with its shadow, is 
the star with its Hght." Looking 
back over the seven years that the 
name of "Thaw" has been dragged 
through the shme by reason of the soulless indiffer- 
ence to moral and social law of that pair of celeb- 
rities, Harry and Evelyn, there is one bright ray 
of light that comes to us — unsullied and chaste 
and pure and sweet — a IMother's love. Despite 
the stigma that has been attached to the name of 
Thaw while it has been trailed through the courts 
and dragged through the gutters of notoriety, 
Mary Copely Thaw, Harry's mother, stands aloof 
— just a plain, devoted mother, whose love is like 
the creeping ivy that clings to wood or stone and 
hides the ruin there. 

The world may think of Harry Thaw what it 
will; he may be devoid of every trait of character 
that makes for better manhood; branded a mur- 
derer and a madman, a derelict, a libertine, and a 
black sheep — he is still "My boy Harry" to his 
mother. 

We have often pictured in our mind that old 
mother; we can see the deep lines in that sweet 
face with its halo of white hair, and in the dim 
eyes we read the story of her grief. Broken in 

29 











■\:M 





health and tortured in mind through the deep dis- 
grace of an only son who has fathomed all depths 
of degradation, she still retains that sweet faith 
and confidence in him which are the undying and 
inexplicable attributes of a mother's love for her 
boy. Throughout the long, tedious trials when her 
son's life w^as at stake, his mother was at his side. 
The family fortune was dissipated in his defense. 
During all these years of his confinement in the 
madhouse, that mother's faith has never wavered 
for an instant. Her prayers have been his ben- 
ediction. And now, when fighting to retain the 
liberty that looked so certain when he made a bold 
dash through the gates of the prison where he had 
been confined for nearly six years, his mother took 
the first train that would carry her to his side. 
"I have come to give Harry the aid of his moth- 
er's presence," was all she said. Just what that 
meant to Harry, we can not say. But to the man 
whose soul is not dead within him, it would mean 
everything" w^orth while. 

Harry Thaw can look back upon nothing but 
a trail of wasted years, a life of uselessness and 
dissipation and crime. But there must be some 
good in a man with a mother like that. And if he 
is at all sensitive to childhood's memories — if there 
is left in his wrecked life just a spark of the tend- 
erness and nobilitv that radiates from the sweet 





30 




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character of his mother, he should be touched to 
the quick by her faith and devotion. 

We fain would eulogize this mother's love, but 
the attempt would be as futile as an attempt to add 
splendor to the sunrise — or fragrance to the breath 
of morn. Better attempt to paint the lily or gild 
refined gold, to add to the bewildering beauty of a 
summer's night or sweeten the perfume of dew- 
bespangled flowers. There is nothing in all this 
life so sweet and beautiful as a mother's love. 

Wq do not know what Fate has in store for 
Harry Thaw — and we care less. There are those 
who believe he has been punished sufficiently for 
his crime. There are others who cling to the 
unwritten law and thereby believe that he com- 
mitted no crime in the killing of Stanford White 
— that he was but defending the sanctity of his 
home. We do not care to attack or defend the 
man in his present position. But should he become 
a free man, we do not believe even his degener- 
ated character can withstand the affectionate 
ministrations of his mother's love which have been 
so forcibly brought home to him in his hours of 
deepest trouble., and he is bound to be a better man. 

Jim Jam Jems, January, 1914. 




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31 





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®he pleasure of a plan 

^^■T" HE penitentiaries of the country are full of 
/ I men who haven't ambition enough to walk 
^^^ into Heaven were the gates ajar — but if 
pushed in w^ould steal the eternal throne 
if it wasn't spiked down. And yet there are men 
in the prisons of the country with more real man- 
hood in the tip of their little finger than is often 
found in the pulpit, in executive office and other 
places of confidence and trust. These remarks are 
occasioned because of a specific incident that 
■recently came to our attention — an incident filled 
with sentiment; it is the story of a mother's love 
and devotion, of a son's honor and manhood — 
a real man. 

Within the four walls of the North Dakota peni- 
tentiary a great, big, good-natured, farmer boy is 
serving a thirteen-year sentence, having been con- 
victed of manslaughter. In an unguarded moment 
and a fit of passion he killed a fellow-being. There 
were extenuating circumstances. And the young 
man had borne an excellent reputation prior to 
this one rash act. He was industrious, honorable 
and reliable. He was his mother's mainstay, her 
one hope in life. But Denver ^^'oods — that is the 
young- man's name — lost his way for a moment 
and that one moment carried him over the brink. 




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32 







He did not attempt to dodge responsibility, how- 
ever; he stood up and took his medicine. His mis- 
fortune broke the old mother's heart, but while he 
realized the ho])elessness of his plight, the young 
man bore the burden manfully and entered upon 
his term as a convict with assurances to his mother 
that all would be right in the end. 

Denver Woods is not a bad man at heart — he 
just made a mistake, that is all. Warden Frank 
Talcott recognized this fact and he assigned the 
young- man to care for the penitentiary herd which 
grazes on the hillsides within a radius of two or 
three miles of the penitentiary. He soon gained 
the Warden's complete confidence and it was evi- 
dent that he intended to be just as good a citizen 
as he had been before that fateful moment — as 
good a citizen as he had been out there on his ranch, 
where he worked and cared for his aged mother. 

Denver had been in the penitentiary a few- 
months w^hen his mother came to Bismarck and 
petitioned Governor Hanna and the pardon board 
for his release. The petition and prayers of the 
kindly old lady were of necessity denied. Heart- 
broken, discouraged and in tears, Denver's mother 
stated to the authorities that she could not live 
long enough to see her son again unless he was 
pardoned; the pleadings of that old mother were 
pathetic beyond the power of w'ords to describe, 

33 





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and as she recited the excellent qualities of her son 
throughout his life and vowed that now in her 
declining years he was her only hope — the menihers 
of the board were deeply impressed; but while 
they would have been pleased to grant the re((uest 
for the mother's sake, Denver had served too short 
a time in consideration of his sentence for a par- 
don to be considered. 

Saddened, wearied and depressed through her 
failure to gain lier boy's liberty, the old lady — 
bent with the weight of the terrible sorrow that 
had come to her — made her way to Baker. Mon- 
tana, where she attempted to make a new liome 
with friends while waiting for the day that would 
bring back to her the boy in whom she never for 
a moment lost faith. 

But the burden was too much for the old mother, 
and in a short time her depression grew into that 
melancholy which ends in death. Realizing that 
the end was near, Denver's mother wrote an 
appealing letter to Ciovernor Hanna. It was the 
])lea of a good mother — a prayer that she might 
see her bov again before she died. Touched bv 
the tender prayer of this old mother, (lOvernor 
Hanna conferred with Warden Talcott. Denver 
Woods was making good. The Warden did not 
hesitate to recommend that the boy be permitted 
to uo. .\nd Governor Hanna and Warden Talcott 






34 



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look it upon themselves to allow Denver Woods 
()l)portunity to show the measure of a man. They 
provided him with money and a railway ticket and 
with a word of encouragement and cheer they sent 
the boy hurrying' on his way to the old mother's 
bedside. No guard accompanied him. He was 
simply placed on his honor to return within a 
reasonable time. Denver Woods sciuared his 
shoulders just a little and looked Warden Talcott 
sc|uarely in the eyes as he said good-bye. "I will 
l)e back just as soon as I can," he said. He boarded 
the train and was gone — out into another state, 

\ alone, no fetter except his conscience, a free man 

— on his honor. Whether he would return or not 
was a matter of speculation. But Denver's heart 
was too true, too big, and the love for that old 

^\ mother too great in him to betray the trust. While 

the thought of seeing his old mother again lifted 

^ the burden from his heart, he was not less happy 

in the knowledge that despite his one great mistake 
— despite his crime — the Governor of the state and 
the Warden who was responsible for his custodv 
— trusted him. 

Fate is a strange dealer. Denver Woods arrived 
just an hour or two too late. The Grim Reaper 
had gathered the spirit of that old mother, and he 
knelt beside the still form — clasped the sweet face 
between his hands — ^^whispered the one word 

35 






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"Mother," and tears fell as a benediction upon her 
whitened hair. When the first handful of earth 
rattled on the rough-box, and the minister repeated 
"Dust to dust," Denver Woods turned slowly 
away and walked toward the railway station. He 
had but one thought — to "make good" with the 
men who had trusted him. He arrived in Bismarck > 
at three o'clock in the morning — the darkest hour 
of the twenty-four. Out on the prairie a mile from 
the city he could see the lights which twinkled over 
the prison walls — the walls that stood bet-ween him 
and man's greatest prize — Liberty! 

But Denver Woods did not hesitate — out in the 
darkness he went, plodding his way along the lone- 
some country road, every step taking him nearer 
to custody, yet nearer to the portals of regained 
manhood. Pie entered the Warden's office: an 
attendant took him down through the corridor; the 
key rattled in the lock, the great iron door swung 
open, Denver Woods passed inside, and the door 
clanged as the young man threw himself onto his 
bunk. He had proved the measure of a man. 

Jim Jam Jems, December, 1914. 





36 



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©hy faithful ^ertrant 



ANNA CAHIIX was a good old soul. 
She liad worked for thirty years for one 
family. She had tended the babies, looked 
after the fires, liad washed the faces of 
the children, prepared them for school, and had 
seen them grow up to young manhood and woman- 
hood. She had seen the little boy grow more like 
his father every day, had watched the slip of a 
"gurrell" as the years lengthened her dresses, and 
had w^atched in a flurry of excitement the daugh- 
ter's debut in society. \\>ek by week she earned 
her wage and she was contented and happy and 
proud of the family that grew older as she grew 
grey. 

Anna was thirty-five when she went to live with 
the family. Her dark hair didn't have a silver 
thread in it. The blue in her eyes was like the 
lakes of Killarney. Her voice was like the sweet 
notes of ,Celtic music. And she w^as proud of her 
place. Widowhood sat lightly on her brow, for 
she had the baby of her mistress to look after. 
She had the master's boy to dress and keep clean. 
She was a "dacint" servant of a "dacint" family 
and it was not for her to gad about and ask for 
another place wlien she was doing so well w^here 

37 




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she was. She was pleased with her place and she 
was proud of the "childer," so she was. 

Then the daughter of the home went away — 
to become the mistress of her own home, and one 
day she came back with her husband and she looked 
so i)retty and sweet while she held her "darlin' little 
bairn" to her pretty breast. And Anna Cahill 
crooned to the child and loved it much. 

And one nioht the son came home very much 
the worse for wear and the kindly old soul 
smuggled him to his room and in the morning she 
brought him some black coffee and toast and a cold 
towel for his aching head and she murmured that 
"byes will be byes," as she wiped a tear that rested 
upon her wrinkled cheek. 

Awav back there when she first came lo live with 
those nice folks the baby grew sick and became 
worse. The mother and father hovered ever near, 
and Anna Cahill worked day and night. She 
seemed to anticipate before the scared mother did 
that the grim harvester was coming after the little 
one to take it up beyond the clouds where there is 
rest. When the blow fell Anna Cahill was there 
to comfort and to counsel, and it was the good 
Anna who prepared the dear little thing for burial 
and went to the church with the family and who 
kept her grief pretty much to herself until that 

38 



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nii^iit — then sobbed herself to sleep in the lone- 
liness of her i)lain room. 

Thirty years passed, three decades of sorrows 
and joys in that household, and Anna Cahill had 
been faithful every day. The black hair had 
turned to white. The blue eyes that had twinkled 
in merriment were dimmed with age. The plump 
hands were gnarled and rough. The steps were 
not as brisk as they had been. She had a clumsy 
way of dropi)ing- the dishes. The sweet voice that 
broke out in song to the babes of the household in 
the years gone by had become a mere vocal rasp 
which made the family shiver. Anna Cahill had 
begun to live in the yesterdays. She had con- 
tracted the hal)it of bringing out a little piece ot 
golden curl, a child's shoe, a dear little dress. 
Tomorrow meant nothing to her. It w as the song 
of childhood for which she listened. 

Then the family decided to move — at least, that 
is the way they said it. Anna Cahill could 
undoubtedly find another place. She was such a 
good servant. So many people would be glad to 
get her. And when the time for removal came, 
Anna Cahill gathered her trinkets, the toys that 
had been the baby's, the scraps ol" silk that had 
gone into the first bride's dress, and many other 
things, and put them into the new and shiny dress 

39 



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suit case that she had bought, and wended her way 
out into New York. 

The first night she slept in a lodging- house. It 
wasn't like the old home. But they were going 
awa}- — had gone away, and while she missed them 
she would not complain. She would rather work 
for them for nothing than for other people for big 
wages. But she would find a nice place. She 
sought for work on the following' day and the next 
and the next. But the fame of Anna Cahill as a 
servant had not preceded her, and the people looked 
askance at the sweet old lady who wanted work. 
The tired feet followed one another across the most 
lonesome city in the world — when one is alone. 

Th.en she found her tottering way back to the 
doorstep wdiere she had sat with the little children. 
There was nothing there but the ghost of the 
yesterdays. It was the same door through which 
they had taken the little white casket of the babe, 
through which the bride had gone amid a shower 
of old shoes, into which she admitted the mischiev- 
ous boy wlu) liad finally grown up and gone away. 
But the pe()i)le there were strangers. And they 
didn't know where Anna Cahill's "folks" had gone. 
The neighbors didn't know. She made her way 
to another dear old lady, Mrs. Emma O'Neill, and 
found sympathy and encouragement. But she 
determined to find her "folks." They could appre- 

40 






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ciatc her housework, her cuHiiary skill, her kindly 
sentiment. And when they found that she had had 
such a hard time getting a place among people who 
didn't know her they would never let her go among 
strange people again. She went out into the city 
again looking for the family who had employed 
her for thirty years. 

One evening she found her way to a lodging- 
house. She wanted a room. The landlady took 
her up three floors. Anna Cahill paid for a week's 
rent in advance. The landlady w^ent down stairs 
and the tired old lady locked the door. The next 
morning she did not appear. Knocks upon the 
door brought no response. There was an odor of 
gas. The room was entered from a fire escape. 
The fumes of gas were almost overpowering. 
Anna Cahill lay still upon the bed. She had not 
found her "folks," but she had joined the little babe 
whose golden curls she had treasured through the 
tears of vears. 

Jim Jam Jems. March. iQif. 




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ply ploth^r 

PERHAPS it was simple habit that prompted 
the writer to adoi)t the editorial "we" in 
editing" Jim Jam Jems. The pronoun "I" 
always sounded too egotistical even for 
"us"; but for this once we insist on departing from 
custom. As the fleeting years roll by, the memory 
of mother has become so sacredly sweet, "we" 
refuse to share that memory with anyone; tonight 
"we" are a boy again, wandering at will amid a 
mighty parterre of flowers, and as we traverse the 
paths of long ago, we pause before the fairest blos- 
som on memory's golden hillside; we pluck it ten- 
derly and hold it close to our heart, while the 
l)etale(l lips and perfumed breath permeate the 
innermost recesses of the soul; for this blossom is 
the memory of — my mother. 

Leaning on the wicket-gate of eternity, I close 
my eyes while a sentiment ''sweet as the smile 
when fond lovers meet, and soft as their parting 
tear" fills the heart. I gaze across the "\'alley 
of Darkness" — back, back oyer the years; there is 
a touch upon my forehead softer than the white 
dove's fluttering breast; it is my mother's good- 
night kiss. Ah. my friends, you may delve in the 
mine lor dazzling gems and explore old ocean's 
deeps for pearls; you may strive for gold until the 

42 





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hands are worn and the heart is cold — but you will 
never bring forth anything that can compare with 
the sacred shrine of a mother's heart. 

My mother — to me — was the grandest woman 
who ever graced the mighty tide of time, and any 
man within whose heart there pulses one drop of 
i>entle blood, within whose brain there was ever -, 
born a noble thought, knows that "mother" is the 
most sacred word ever framed by celestial lips. It 
is the breath of which heaven was born, the divine ' 
essence increate of love and life beyond the grave. 

If there is one jot of manhood in my makeup — 
a single pure and wholesome thought within my 
heart — it was planted there by mother. To her 
I owe not only life, but every honest sentiment and 
trait of manliness and honor which 1 may possess. 
If I have looked at the towering heights above me 
with undaunted eye and measured my strength 
against walls of stone, it is because of the strength 
of a character moulded by a good mother's love. 

As the mighty clock of time ticks off the years, 
the memory of my mother becomes sweeter and 
sweeter. There is so much dross with the gold 
of life's experiences that at times I wonder if any- 
thing is real. But as I explore that little corner 
of the heart wherein I have locked the memory of 
my mother, I am able each day to separate the real 



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from the unreal, for my mother's love was the 
purest gold. 

In memory tonight, I draw the silvery head of 
mother to my shoulder; my lips caress the wrinkled 
brow and linger there. I recall for the minute her 
sweet faith — the faith she imparted to me — the 
faith instilled in my heart as a boy — the faith that 
has acted as my sheet anchor in storm and stress. 
Dark and drear indeed must be life's pilgrimag-e 
to those w^ho see in heaven no star of hope. The 
dreams of youth may become dust and ashes; 
ambition may be thwarted: so far as the world 
goes, life may prove a failure; but as I watch the 
stars shining down from the blue immensity and 
the cooling mists creeping 'round the purple hills, 
my mother's sweet faith gives me strength to battle 
on and on. while her memory fills the heart with 
fierce Rames of strong endeavor. 

^^'ould that I could dip deep down into the pro- 
found depths of the sacred lake of my mother's 
tears, and cast out of my boyhood life every 
thoughtless act that brought to her a single sigh. 
\\'oul(l that I could in reality turn back the pages 
of time and blot out those lines in my boyhood and 
young manhood which caused the forgiving tears 
to steal silently down my mother's cheek. What 
boy lias lived who has not thoughtlessly brought 
tears and grief to mother? And what mother has 



44 




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lived whose tears have been anything but forgive- 
ness? Dear old mother, as I look back at that 
hour of supreme agony when I held you close to 
my heart for the last time, while the angel of death 
signaled the tired eyelids to close and the fluttering 
spirit slipped into the sunless sea of eternity; as 
I recall the whispered ''good-bye, my boy" — while 
deepest sorrow was mine and eternal peace was 
thine — your sweet faith bursts upon me With all its 
wondrous beauty and strength, and something 
within the heart whispers — "Yes. we will meet 
again." 

So long as the breath of life lasts, my mother's 
faith will guide me. And when eternity beckons 
me. 1 will step into the silent boat and push av\a\- 
from life's uncertain shore with that faith as mv 
compass. I close my eyes tonight and feel the mes- 
meric touch of my mother's hand; I raise it rever- 
ently to my lips, and- with a smile for those w'lo 
love me and a sigh for those who hate, I am a 
better man tonight because I am living once again 
in memory surrounded by the sacred atmospliere 
of a mother's love. 

Jim Jam Jems, May, 191J. 







45 




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^i0 (BveaU^t plonitment 

^^T' HEV are going to build a monument to Gene 
/ I Field. It is to be a marble monument, and 
^^ the nien who are raising the money hope 
that the shaft will stand as long as the 
"Little Boy Blue" poem. Perhaps it will — but only 
perhaps. For the story of "Little Boy Blue" has 
reached into thousands and thousands of hearts, 
and the hands of fathers and mothers who have 
lost their little ones have stretched througli the 
mists of time and touched again and again tlie 
memory of Gene Field. 

Gene Field gave to the world a great deal more 
tlian he received — and he saw a lot of fun, too. 
He was one of the wittiest writers America has 
ever known, and beneath his humor there lay a 
\ein of thoughtful melancholy which would bring 
the tears, l^'or, witty as he was, he possessed a 
heart that bowed down with each sorrowing one 
around him, and lie wept when they wepl. 

He w^as a genius in all things that he liked — but 
in financial matters he was a child. He was a good 
deal like O. Henry, whose death saddened the 
hearts of two continents just a little while ago. 
It was said of O. Henry that, "He never sees you 
but that he wants to borrow seven dollars." Gene 
Field contributed to the wealth of happiness of 

46 











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those around him, but he had always drawn ahead 
at the office. 

He wrote the simple heart songs in a plain way 
and the whole world understood. For mankind 
can understand the genius who writes plainly. He 
turned to newspaper work naturally, and he wrote 
naturally. He saw the stories in the sticks and the 
stones. He understood the hurts and the bruises 
that come to men and women. That was the secret 
ot his great hold ui)on the people. That was why 
a whole nation seemed to grieve when the messaee 
was sent over the wires: "Gene Field is dead." 
He was the kind of man who wrote children's 
poems which children liked. The little ones played 
round his feet, climbed over him, made much of 
him, and his love for them was as true as his child- 
hood sentiments were beautiful. There was such a 
genuineness about him that the childhood poetry 
he wrote touched the heart strings and the music 
still throbs and quivers and sings in rhythmic 
fealty. 

When Gene Field died the little children of Chi- 
cago sorrowed as they would at the bier of some 
one in the home. It is said that a lady went into 
a florist's to get some flowers to take to the resi- 
dence. She was a friend of the family. A little 
girl, a poor little girl, with holes in her shoes and 
a dress that was torn, stood there and looked at 





47 





the tiowers. Slic heard the lady say tlial the flow- 
ers were for Juii*ene Field.' "Oh, are you gointc 
to Mr. Field's?" she asked. "Mister, won't you 
please give me just one flower — just only one? 
Please, Mister, and maybe this lady will take it and 
they will let my flower that you give me lie on his 
)\coftin." The florist |)icked a beautiful long- 
■ stemmed white rose. He gave it to the little girl, 
the child who had ne\ er seen Gene Field, but who 
had read his "Sharps and Flats," and his children's 
poems. And the lady took the long-stemmed white 
rose and placed it in the cold and pulseless hand of 
the dead poet. And it went to the grave with Gene 
Field. 

There is no monument like that. 

Jim Jam Jems, October, 1913. 



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^^■THKY were ])0()r. Their years liad been 
/ 1 uncolored by the i)icture of riches. He 
^^ (Irudi^ed and she drudged. The cliildren 
that i)laye(l in the neighl)orhood were not 
theirs. The plain little house where they lived was 
not theirs. ])ut they paid their rent and lived their 
days and their weeks without change. They had 
known what hope was in the beginning. They 
looked toward the time when their own roof would 
give them shelter, and the big trees would shade 
their humble cot. Their dreams did not ask for 
much — but even that little did not come. There 
are so many dreams that never come true! 

One day the wife began to fail. Physically she 
was all right, but the long, lonesome fruitless light 
had i)laced its stamp upon her mentality. As she 
grew worse, the burden of the husband became 
greater. .\t first he thought it was temper. But 
the clouds thickened and the light of reason went 
out. His life partner was hoi)elessly insane. She 
could recognize no one. The man whom she had 
married was a mere part of the gathered picture 
before her mentally sightless eyes. He onl\' hel])ed 
to blur the outlook. So they took her to the asylum. 
The end would be a kindness to her, he was told. 

49 



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It was sixteen years ago when "the darkness came 
on swiftly and the gloaming turned to night." 

And then one day, after long years of darkness, 
the light blazed forth. Reason was again 
enthroned. The woman, w^hom they called Eliza- 
beth, could remember. She remembered William — 
the man she had married in her girlhood. But 
Will was gone. The sturdy, patient worker had 
been told there was no hope and he had gone out 
into the imknown world where he might court for- 
getfulness. AAHien Elizabeth was cured she was 
asked about her relatives and she simply replied: 

"I don't w^ant to embarrass them. I am just a 
bit of unclaimed baggage so long as Will is gone." 

And then she was transferred from one public 
institution to the other. She went from asylum to 
poorhouse. In the shelter of the almshouse she 
found the refuge that was at any rate material. 
She didn't sob away her days and nights. She 
didn't take grief for her companion. But with a 
sunny smile she worked to give happiness to those 
around her. She filled every minute of the day 
with work — for others. She made the crippled and 
the maimed and the helpless more contented. She 
safeguarded the homeless little children. She 
worked always for others and when she lay down 
to rest at night she realized that work alone, 
unselfish, zealous, thoughtful work, is the greatest 

50 




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burden-lifter in the world. They called her 
"Mother Elizabeth" out at the poorhouse where 
she and God brought most of the sunshine. 

There were three years of life in the poor house, 
three years of giving happiness and comfort to 
others. Her life had been a benediction. She 
made the weak and the forlorn believe again that 
there is something more than darkness. 

Then one day a man walked down the corridor 
of the public building. He was gray, tanned, and 
bore the evidences of rugged health and prosper- 
ity. He had come to tlie sanitorium to gaze once 
more upon the unresponsive features of the woman 
who had come into his life in the long ago. He 
had a faint hope that she might recognize him 
after all these years. But she w^as gone! She 
had been cured! Three years ago she had crossed 
the borderland to dependable mentality. She had 
been discharged. For a time no one seemed to 
know just where she had gone. The delays were 
maddening. Perhaps she was suffering — perhaps 
she was ill or in want, and now he had so much! 
Finally the trail was found; it led to the poor-house 
in Wyandotte county, Kansas. As the gray-haired 
man hurried up the path, "Mother Elizabeth" came 
out to call the children to dinner. 

"Will!" she cried. 

"Ehzabeth !" was his only response as the tired 

51 







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body of the sweet old woman rested in his strong 
arms. 

He had gone into the new country, he told her, 
and had finally found prosperity just a few weeks 
before. He had come back thinking that with 
money he could employ a great specialist — that 
maybe there was some hope. 

And the dream that seemed such a simple dream 
in the long, long ago, has at last come true. The 
shade trees shelter their humble cot; the bitterness 
of the years has passed like an uneasy dream and 
they are happy at last — just w^ith each other. 

Jim Jam Jems. August, 1913. 



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^v^IKE a glimpse. of a forgotten dream, the 
#11 T picture of a gray-haired old mother bend- 
^m^ ing over a great American flag, has been 
haunting us for many days. How quickly 
a man's thoughts are purified by a picture like 
this ! How the pulse quickens, and the heart seems 
to flutter with a longing for that touch of a moth- 
er's hand, for just a word or a caress from the - , ^ 
sweet-faced mother of long ago! No man, within \\ ^'M 
whose heart there pulses one drop of gentle blood; 
within whose brain there was ever born a noble 
thought; within whose soul is enshrined the 
instincts of a manly man, can look upon this pic- 
ture without a sigh, without a fierce longing to 
draw the silvery head of the old mother close to 
his breast and whisper the sentiment that springs 
unbidden to the lips — the sentiment that is born 
of a mother's love and lives forever in the human 
heart. 

The picture in mind is that of Mrs. Mary Col- 
well, of Seattle. She sent her boy Harley away 
to the navy; all she got back was a big American 
flag. Two years ago he came back to the old 
home on a furlough. He brought the' old mother 
a great bundle of Marie Van Houttes, ready for 
planting, and mother and son spent the afternoon 

53 




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in the garden setting out the slips of roses. "I 
shall call them my Mary roses," he said, "after 
you, mother mine." Then he kissed her — that 
sweet old mother — and it seemed good to have that 
fine, manly son of hers home again. But soon, all 
too soon, duty called the lad and he hurried back to 
join his comrades on the U. S. Submarine F-4. . 

"Harley, boy," said his mother, just as he was 
leaving, "I'm afraid that submarine isn't safe." 
"As safe as a cellar," he smiled back into the 
serious face of his mother; "You should see how 
fine she trims." And then he patted her cheek, 
kissed her good-bye and was gone. 

"He lied to her like a gentleman," said his aunt, 
Margaret Hall, in telling the story to a reporter. 
"He knew it was a death-trap. His letters had 
been full of it, and he had told his father what to 
expect." 

The fate of the F-4, while maneuvering off 
Honolulu, is familiar in detail to all of us. Only 
the other day, when the hulk of the F-4 was finally 
brought to the surface, it was found impossible to 
identify bodies with but a very few exceptions. A 
bundle of bones representing fourteen members of 
the ill fated crew was given military burial in 
Ailington cemetery. Mrs. Colwell was invited to 
attend this funeral, for her boy Harley was among 
those unidentified. 





54 




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Just a few days before the funeral, Secretary 
Daniels sent Mrs. Colwell a package. "Harley's 
things," she muttered, as her trembling fingers 
opened the package. But instead of the little Bible 
she had given him and the pictures and keepsakes 
he had carried, the package contained a great 
American Flag — Old Glory — and it unfolded at the 
feet of the mother. 

Mrs. Colwell couldn't attend the funeral at 
Washington. So she spent the day alone — with a 
picture of her boy, the great flag and an armful of 
"Mary roses." 

And this is the picture that has been haunting 
us — the picture of a w'hite-haired mother, a great 
cluster of Mary roses in her arms, her face buried 
in the folds of Old Glorv! 

Jim Jam Jems, November, 191 5. 



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55 





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gut ®lm ffiadh^b %x\ 



^^^ HEY called him ''Big Tim." and he was 
i I 'BiR Tim." It was seldom that people 

^^ knew whom you meant there in New York 
when you expressed a curiosity about 
Congressman Sullivan. But after you had made 
your patient and often nearly futile explanations 
the smile would come to the face of your friend and 
he would understand that it was "Big- Tim" you 
were inquiring about. 

He was schooled in the University of Hard 
Knocks and had been a close student at the College 
of Broad Manhood. And those great institutions 
never presented an alumnus who held dearer to 
his heart the lessons he had learned day by day 
as he climbed across and over the obstacles which 
led from a newsboy's life to that of a congress- 
man. For "Big Tim" remembered. 

When "Big Tim" began his education he was 
such a little boy, such a cold and hungry mite of 
a lad, selling newspapers on the streets of New 
York. He began where many, many public men 
started on the successful road to prominence; for 
the little boy, shivering and dancing, learned to 
read faces, grew to know men. He sold more 
papers than the usual boy. because his brain worked 






56 








as fast as his flying feet. There wasn't a laggard 
drop of blood in his little frame. 

From the newsboy's route he made his way to 
the printshop. He left school at eight. Step In- 
step he climbed in the various offices, and when he 
was twenty-three he was elected to the New York 
general assembly. He was a strong man there, 
for he knew men. He was never gifted as an 
orator, but he could get bills through which no 
orator could help. He had a secret in the art of 
successful legislation. He always played the game 
square with his brothers. They knew that if the 
young- legislator, whom they called "Dry Dollar" 
Sullivan in those days, realized that they had 
helped his bill that it required no promise from him 
to help theirs. He was there when the vote was 
called and with many more than his own. 

Step by step the young Irishman went higher. 
Thousand upon thousand he added to his wealth. 
He never tasted liquor in his life, never smoked a 
cigar. His overpowering passion was gambling, 
and he was not successful in that. But as a busi- 
ness man, he was keen and sharp, and the grasp 
that he had of business detail was remarkable. 
Yet if he had started down Broadway with $10,000 
he would have been penniless when he reached the 
end of the thoroughfare, giving every cent of it 
away. His greatest happiness came in making 



/// 



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others happy, and there were many of his charities 
that were given by stealth. 

But there was one clay in each year when the 
people of the w'hole world learned something more 
of Big Tim. It was the anniversary that he never 
forgot, and on the sixth day of February of each 
year the uncrowned king of a great democracy 
bought shoes for the thousands. He knew what it 
w'as to be hungry. He knew what it meant to go 
scantily clad. Experience had taught him what 
dry shoes meant to those who were in need. For 
on that same day, many years before, when he w^as 
a little boy, a kind teacher had pitied his poverty 
as she looked upon the little cold toes peeking 
through broken leather and had bought him a pair 
of new shoes. His coat was ragged. His little 
stomach might know the cravings of hunger when 
he wore those new shoes, but the feet were pro- 
tected and dry, and he believed that there was 
nothing in all the wide world so comforting as dry 
feet wdien one is so very, very poor. He never 
forgot the sweet young woman who had mothered 
him that day, and when he grew^ wealthy he made 
a holiday of February 6th. It was the day that 
Big Tim issued tickets to the w^eary and w'orn 
and provided that each ticket bearer should have 
a substantial pair of new shoes. 

Many a wandering man, disheartened and 

58 






^>0}.^ 






broken, put on a pair of Big Tim shoes and marched 
on to a victorious fight for better things. Many 
a poor woman, alone and unprovided for, found 
flour and meat and potatoes and coal, and though 
no message came she knew that Big Tim, bless his 
rugged heart, had searched her out and determined 
that she must not hunger or grow cold. He was 
the defender of the weak, and while Big Tim had 
a dollar it was free to the use of any homeless 
wanderer who crossed his path. He believed that 
dry feet made men better and stronger and braver, 
and he dedicated that winter day each year to the 
memory of the one who in the long ago had taught 
him and had been kind to him. 

It is all over now. The homeless wanderer witli 
the wet feet will go along the Bow^ery in New York 
and wonder if there will ever be another Big Tim. 
But there won't. For Big Tim has gone, and there 
will never be another like him. 

They held the funeral from the Catholic church, 
where Big Tim was a regular worshiper. 'J'here 
were twenty thousand people there. The man in 
broadcloth reached over and consoled the sorrow- 
ing brother in rags. The penniless and the pros- 
perous prayed silently for the repose of the soul 
of the man who had contributed to more material 
comfort than perhaps any other man in American 
historv. Brave hearts were bowed down when the 





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casket was removed. Strong" men sobbed when 
they looked for the last time on the face of the 
man who had found eternal youth by following the 
lessons of the hungry days when he sold newspa- 
pers, and had made every man, woman and child 
happy when it was within his power. Peace to the 
ashes of Big Tim! May the winds of February 
sing their requiem gently over his grave. For 
February is a hard month and Big Tim helped his 
fellow men to get through it. 

//■;/( Jam Jems. October. 1013. 




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§0mebobB*0 iWother 



E drifted into a local beanery yesterday to 
accumulate a bowl of soup with dill pickle 
accompaniment. Seated at the counter 
we noticed an old lady sipping a cup of 
coffee and chiseling desolation through a slab of 
apple-pie. Beyond her, toward the end of the 
counter, were a number of men — most of them the 
usual hangers-on at a lunch counter where flip and 
slangy gazelles cavort with the chinaware. 

The old lady was roughly, yet neatly clad, and 
despite the fact that the day was warm, her head 
was bundled in a coarse shawd which was drawn 
over the shoulders and knotted at the w^aist behind. 
The boys — a bunch of rowdies, nothing more — 
were having great sport in mimicking the old lady. 
One of them, a flaxenhaired sissy with a red neck- 
tie, who parted his hair in the middle and his silly 
smile on the side — grasped his cup in both hands 
and drank his coffee with a decided accent, making 
every eft"ort to mock the old lady and follow her 
motions. The other members of the gang of 
young toughs w'ere chuckling wath glee, bantering 
words with the waitresses and asking, "How 



eggs did 
there anv 



the old eirl bring' in todav 



grey 



hairs in the butter 



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give 



the old girl a milk-stool 



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her false teeth on that rubber-pie," and a few more 
expressions along- this line. 

It was apparent that the old lady was annoyed 
and her thin hands trembled as she raised the cup 
to her lips and sipped the coffee — probably the first 
food or drink she had tasted since long before 
daylight when she prepared breakfast for a hungry 
mob at the farm, gathered together her basket of 
produce and bumped into town in a lumber-wagon 
to trade her butter and eggs for groceries. Once 
we saw her glance at the gang of brainless yaps 
and just the faintest touch of color o'erspread the 
withered features as she caught a stinging remark; 
then she finished her meager meal, separated ten 
cents from the little knot of silver in the corner of 
her handkerchief, settled with the cashier, picked 
up her market-basket and started to leave the 
place. As we stepped to the door and held it open 
for her to pass out, and received her kindly smile 
and "Thank you" in return for this simple cour- 
tesy, the gang of rowdies and hoodlums burst into 
loud "guffaws." 

Somehow the incident fastened itself upon us 
and we could not resist the temptation to make it 
the subject of a story for today. We have thought 
of the kindlv old ladv as "somebodv's mother," 
and tried to picture what would have happened 
lo that gang of rowdies who made sport of her, if 




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the strai)i)ing big son at home on the farm had 
dropped in and witnessed the scene. No doubt 
the old mother, as she drove out of the city that 
afternoon, thanked God that her boy was just a 
plain, honest farm-hand, and not a city-bred 
gosling. While she may have had dreams of the 
day when honest toil and frugal life would leave 
margin enough from the earnings of the old home- 
stead to start "John" away to college, some day, 
surelv now she would rather that her boy remain 
an ignorant, plain farm-hand, who w^ould never 
forget the simple teachings of life to honor father 
and mother, than that he should become a city 
chap who spends his leisure hours in hanging about 
a lunch counter or on the street corners, waiting 
to walk home with some freckle-faced Jane wdio 
tends, bar in a second-class restaurant. 

Somebody's mother? Yes, indeed! And one 
that any man might well be proud of. We only 
hope that this article will fall into the hands of 
some of those young men who laughed at this old 
lady's plainness. Maybe they w^U stop their 
rowdyism long enough to think of their own old 
mothers, and in the blush of shame that must per- 
force mount their cheek, may there be enough man- 
hood in their niggardly carcasses to invoke a sol- 
emn oath never again to make sport of a kindly 
old lady, who may be "Somebody's Mother." 





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63 



Jim Jam Jems, May, igi2. 




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HEN a little child can teach us, when a 
crippled newsboy can instruct, when 
thousands of men bare their heads in 
grief as the silent casket of a young news 
vendor is carried through the crepe-bedecked 
streets while strong men weep upon the shoulders 
of grieving women — it is then that we realize more 
firmly than ever before the fact that no righteous 
act is lost, and there goes passing down the gen- 
erations a simple story of a child's sacrifice that 
makes men love their brothers better. 

Since the dawn ol creation there has come ring- 
ing down the centuries that ever-present query: 
"Am I my brother's keeper?" And unto eternity 
men will take different sides of the (|uestion — it 
will still be a matter of doubt in many minds. 
Billy Rugh \\as a cripi)le. He was a newsboy 
at Garv, Indiana. He had come into the town five 
years before and was trusted for his first bundle 
of papers. Through these years he had done the 
best he could. His life was plain and uneventful. 
Once in a while he would go to the moving picture 
show. Another time the melodrama would catch 
his dime. But the days came and went with tlie 
old regularity and Billy Rugh, the newsboy, found 
little to mark any particular day as possessed ot 

64 



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more than ordinary interest. He earned his liv- 
ing and was able occasionally to help a worn plod- 
der who had become ''lost on the way." 

Sometimes as Billy Rugh stood on the sidewalk 
w^ith his bundle of papers under one arm and the 
heavy crutch under the other, a pretty girl would 
come along and as she took from her scented purse 
the coin for the paper she bought, his eyes would 
fall, his hand tremble just a little bit, and his gaze 
would travel to that dwarfed and shrunken leg 
which was to deny him. he thought, a place as a 
man among men. 

His infirmity was not the subject of discussion. 
He talked only to his own heart of the pinched and 
suffering days and nights that came because some- 
where, somehow, there had been something amiss 
and a baby-boy was left a cripple — left with only 
one leg on which to march to a glorious victory. 
What he thought he told his God. The storv that 
welled up from his boyish heart was not for the 
idly curious. His hurt w-as a sacred thing, one 
which concerned only Billy Rugh and his Maker. 
It had kept him from the boyish games. It had 
draggled when he sought to chase his playmate. 
It had been in the way when Billy Rugh had sought 
to show his prowess. Dead and useless it dangled 
as he walked, marking him in the long distance as 
one who worked in spite of a handicap. 

65 



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But with all this Billy Rugh was cheerful. He 
asked no favors — he earned his way and bore more 
than his share. He believed in good citizenship, 
in finer impulses. But throughout all those tire- 
some years while he made his way with one leg" 
and a crutch he always believed it was for other 
and stronger men to become the teachers — to 
become the wearers of honors. There was no 
iealousy on his part when he thought of how imi)os- 
sible it would be for him to display those qualities 
which make the hearts of men beat in happy 
a])plause. 

And yet. Billy Rugh was the greatest hero that 
Garv ever knew. He gave his life for a little girl 
— one whom he had never seen — that she might 
be saved from death or from living the life ot a 
])oor, maimed creature, the object ot universal 
])ity. There were no fireworks about the going- 
away of Billy Rugh. He made up his mind to 
giye his leg to save tlie life which depended on 
grafted-skin furnished by other ])eople. And 
"other people" stood back to allow the cripi)led 
newsboy to make his way into the hospital and say ; 
"Cut off my leg. Doc, and save the young lady's 
life," 

Ethel Smythe lay u])on a hos[)ital bed and 
waited for the verdict of the doctors. All that 
day they had hesitated. More skin for grafting 




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was needed and was not forthcoming. Then Billy 
Rugh appeared and the surgeons told her all was 
well — someone had heen found who would go 
through the ordeal that she might 1)e spared. 

Deftly and quickly the surgeons worked. The 
crippled leg of the newshoy was amputated and 
the men of science hurriedly made use of what the 
lad had given up — Ethel Smythe's life was saved. 

But how about Billy Rugh! The ether was too 
much for those weak lungs. The flat" and narrow' 
chest of the little cripple — unequal to the new test 
imposed u[)on it — did not rise and fall with that 
regularity the surgeons desired. Pneumonia had 
fastened its gri]). The breathing became more 
difficult. The strength of the newsboy hero grew^ 
less and less. Doctors stood at his bedside 'arid 
battled on and on. Every know^i device was 
resorted to to save the brave young life. But 
down and down went Billy Rugh into the Valley 
of the Shadow — and the surgeons knew there was 
no hope. The sick girl was wheeled into his room. 
She took Billy's brown little hands in hers and 
w^ept. Then she leaned forward and kissed him. 
"Poor little girl," he murmured; "I'm all right, 
don't you worry about me," and then he wandered 
in delirium through the meadow-grass and by the 
brookside. down the creek-bank and across — 
stumping his weary w^ay along. 





67 





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Toward the end Billy Rugh came out of his 
delirium and when he looked at the kindly doctor 
he said: ''This ain't a bad w^orld after all, is it, 
Doc? Folks is folks. L guess I have really been 
good for something after all." Then as the voice 
grew weaker — the breath shorter — the tired eye- 
lids closed and Billy Rugh, the crippled newsboy, 
who had measured higher than man's estate when 
real manhood was needed — passed forever into the 
land o' dreams. 

They hehl the funeral there, in Gary. There 
were four bands, and the minister stood in the fire 
department automobile to preach the sermon. The 
streets were filled with people. It recjuired more 
than an hour for the crowds to pass the casket 
banked high with flowers — the casket that held tlie 
remains of a stunted newsboy who had made a 
wicked city stop and think, who had made strong- 
men weep as they knelt to pray for the first time, 
who had made every man, woman and child in Gary- 
want to get nearer to Our Father ^Mlo xA.rt in 
Heaven. 

They took the boy's body back to the old home 
at Rock Island. Illinois, and there again the people 
showed their honor and respect for the lad who 
had proved after all. that every life is worth while. 
And when the services were over, and the men and 
women had gone back to their daily cares, helped 

68 



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>hM 



and made better by the life that had gone out, there 
kept stirring through the memory of them all those 
simple words: ''This ain't a bad world after all, 
is it, Doc?" 

Billy Rugh's crippled limb, which had seemed to 
be the very depth of misfortune, has made him a. 
man of history — has made a million men an( 
women stop and think. And when they get the" 
lesson that Billy Rugh taught, that million of men 
and women are better because he lived. 

/;';;/ Jam Jems, November, 1912. 



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V boy is coming" home from the west, 
where he has been for two whole 
years on business," said the patient 
old lady. "1 have missed him very 
niucli for he has been such a good boy. I hope that 
lie can stay, for I am getting a little old, and I'd 
like to have my boy with me." And the neighbor 
kissed her and she cried, too, for she was glad that 
the old mother didn't know. 

That night Nolan L. Gartner stepped froni the 
train. An old neighbor met him and shook his 
liand. Another i)assed 1)\' without si)eaking'. But 
the new arrival hurried to the old home. For 
there the agx'd mother was watching and waiting". 
Nolan 1.. dartner had been released that day 
from the state ])rison. He came home as an 
ex-convict. Two years before he had been sen- 
tenced for six years for embezzlement, and when 
they took him away he had asked but one favor. 
''Don't tell mother," he said. "Do anytliing you 
want with me, but don't tell mother, for it would 
kill her." And the\- did as he re(|uested. The 
"])oy" went home for the last time before they 
took him away. A "friend" went with him, and 
the kind old lad\- dixided the time between helping 
lier son ])ack his things and giving him little pats 

70 



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111)011 the hack. I'^or he was her hoy and he liad 
ahvays l)een a t^ood hoy. 

They took liiin away to the i)risoii then, and lie 
did the hest he could He wrote weekh- letters to 
his mother "from tlie west." and told her of his 
experiences there and his hopes and his amhitions. 
How heautifnlly he lied! How splendidly he told 
tlie heroic falsehoods! And with each letter 
hreathino- hope, the kind old mother knelt and 
prayed that C.od would he i^ood to her hoy who 
was so far, far a\va\ . vShe asked that he he kept 
from harm, from evil associates, that he attend 
church, that he be a good boy. And then, in her 
feeble way, she would send a line that would reach 
the imprisoned man up there in the penitentiary. 
She would write of her hope and longing to see him. 

The man worked on. Kor with that mother's 
faitlT a new hope grew in the heart bowed down 
there in that lonely cell. The gentle influence of 
a mother's love had crossed the rivers and the 
valleys and had touched her boy, just as her 
l)rayers had touched him when he lay sick in the 
childhood of long ago. He was a good prisoner, 
and they let him out. They only kept him two 
years when he had been sentenced for six. .\nd 
when he w ent first to see his aged mother it proved 
That the kindness and the mercy of that big Ohio 
governor was not mis])laced. For Nolan Gartner 

71 



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was a "good boy" again, ready to start life anew. 
And when he held that dear old mother in his arms 
he knew' that he could still win the fight. 

Kingston. Ohio, must be an unusual town, with 
unusual people. For two long years there was 
force enough in that little town to keep the gossips 
from the mother, the talebearers from the door- 
step. The really good people must strongly pre- 
dominate in Kingston, Ohio, because for two long 
vears there was not one evil whisper to that dear 
old mother concerning her son. And now she is 
luippy — for her boy is home again. 

Jim Jam Jems, November. 1913. 



72 



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^ ©itanic ^eath 

IDNIGHT— April- 19, 1912, at the mo- 
ment these Hnes are penned, the world 
stands in horrified awe as the truth of the 
greatest of all ocean disasters — the loss 
of the "Titanic" — dawns upon us. The mind 
gropes feebly as it grapples with the awfulness of 
the details flashed o'er tlie wires tonight of how 
this greatest achievement of man's ingenuity met 
in mid-ocean a floating moimtain of ice, whose 
chill breath was a blast of death to 1,589 souls. 

Picture if you can, a floating city of luxury, 
which comprised tlie very limit of human construc- 
tion, carrying more than two thousand souls — as 
cosmopolitan a gathering of humanity as could be 
brought together. Men from every walk of life — 
titans of finance, writers of world-renown, mer- 
chant princes, famous artists; world-leaders on the 
one hand, mechanics, common-laborers, immigrants 
and peasants on the other. 

It was Sunday night. Many had retired to their 
couches and were slumbering peacefully in the 
thought that man's ingenuity of construction w^as 
an absolute safeguard against peril; others were 
smoking and chatting liai)pily in the luxurious 
salons. The strains of music from the Sunday 
night concert by the ship's orchestra had barely 

73 




I I 

11 






(lied away, when of a sudden two worlds — nature's 
creation and man's creation — came together; the 
work of man crumpled like cardboard with tlie 
impact against this demon of Nature, and Death — 
shadowy, indistinct, like a spirit wrapt in mist — 
loomed above the ill-faled craft. 

And then, as though from the trumpet of eternity 
— risin<?- ever louder on the blast — came the sten- 
torian tones of the Ca])lain's voice: "All hands on 
deck with life-belts on! Lower the lifeboats!" As 
that mighty captain of the seas stood on the bridge 
of his ship with the clarion call of "Duty!" ringing 
in his ears, he gave those commands to his inferiors 
which brought order out of chaos, and while men 
groped madly for their senses, while women 
shrieked and swooned in the agony of despair, duty 
con(|uered and manhood won a victory that will 
live in the heart of humanity so long as the human 
race endures. 

Gradually the truth came to each heart — the 
mighty Titanic was doomed! And then the thun- 
derous voice of the chieftain again sounded above 
the din of death's despair — "Women hrst ! Women 
first!". 

Ah, who can know what was in the hearts of 
those l)rave men who drew their loved ones to them 
in that last embrace, ])laced them in the life-boats 
and then stepped back for other brave hearts to 



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74 



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murmur a last farewell, and face eternity at the 
call of duty! 

Could there be any greater test of manhood than 
this? True — men were there who gloated over 
life as a miser does his gain. When we read those 
three words, "Ismay w^as Saved!" — Bruce Ismay, 
the managing director of the \Miite Star Steam- 
ship Company — we know that cowardice was there 
as well as manhood. But thank God for the man- 
hood that was there. 

John Jacob Astor, head of that noted family of 
the world's greatest financiers, stood side by side 
with the lowly peasant ; his countless millions were 
forgotten and overshadowed bv that call "Dutv!". 
As the last boat was lowered carrying with it his 
only ho])e, he did not falter; he "stood back" and 
took his place among men. 

And this sacrifice to manhood by one who had 
conquered every obstacle heretofore arising in life's 
pathway, pales into nothing as compared to that 
sacrifice of a mother — Mrs. Isadore Strauss — who 
linked her arm through that of her husband — the 
father of her children — and met death calmly with 
him rather than accept life without him. It was 
the .sons of mothers like Mrs. Strauss wdio raised 
that cry. "Women first!" and enforced the order at 
the point of their guns. 

The life-boats, tossed like tinv shells on the breast 



\% 



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of the treacherous sea, hovered in the distance 
while their cargo of human souls watched and 
waited — for what? The stars that flame like fire- 
flies in the silken web of night, twinkled with tears 
of despair. By their dim light, the outline of the 
proud Titanic — now a crippled, bleeding mass of 
wreckage — was discernable. Softly upon the mid- 
night air came the strains of soulful music — the 
ship's band was playing its own funeral dirge — 
and as the notes of ''Nearer My God To Thee" 
floated out to those in the life-boats, they saw the 
Titanic lunge with a mighty explosion, as she flung 
herself into the bosom of the deep. And just as 
the waters were closing over the lost Titanic, those 
silent watchers saw their gallant captain leap clear 
of his bridge far into the sea — the cool waves car- 
essed his lips and drew away his breath in one 
long, clinging kiss, as he was cradled in their depth 
like a weary child and fell asleep. 

Oh, God! What greater epitaph could humanity 
ask than that which will be inscribed to the memory 
of Captain Smith, of John Jacob Astor, of William 
Stead, of Major Butt, of Mrs. Isadore Strauss and 
those others who heard the call of duty, of man- 
hood and womanhood. "They died a Titanic death !" 

Jim Jam Jems, May, igi2. 





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©reateet itole 

HE melody that purls from the lips of 
Madame Schmiiann-Heink reaches to the 
heart and goes on singing to the soul for 
days afterward. The beautiful voice of 
this glorious woman has been heard in every por- 
tion of the world, and people delighted and took 
to themselves every note poured forth in the sweet 
song of the splendid artist. Kings have found joy 
and peasants have taken new hope when her mar- 
velous voice poured forth in the music which melted 
like the sweet tones of a perfect bell, humming, 
humming, humming until the last tuneful note had 
dropped lower and lower and left only the memory 
whicli made you grateful for the privilege of hear- 
ing. All was forgotten, all was overlooked in the 
magnetism of that matchless voice. In an army 
barracks, bleak and bare, in a frontier hall devoid 
of all art, that voice would charm and soothe and 
intoxicate with the same certainty that it would 
touch the soul of the metropolitan audience in the 
palatial theatre. 

And the public press comes to us and awakens 
us from our dream of sunlit lanes and mountain 
streams and flower bespangled meadows. For the 

77 



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newspapers tell us that the wonderful songstress 
is but human after all, and that while she has 
awakened the thousands upon thousands by her 
musical art there has groveled back tiiere behind 
the scenes the family skeleton which spells bitter- 
ness and disappointment. The divorce court has 
claimed this wonderful woman for its own, for the 
time being, and there is intermingled with th( 
l)laudits of the tireless listeners to her delightful 
gift and attainment the sordid story of the union 
with a man who complains. 

The first time we heard Madame Schumann- 
Heink we thought that she must be inspired. It 
was like the heavenly voice that sang to hearts 
bowed down. Later when we grew older we 
realized something else. We ascertained that the 
woman whose charm had reached us with an influ- 
ence that could never be efifaced, had 1)een the 
motlier of nine children, one of whom had gone 
into that land where there is always music. Then 
we understood. Part of the time that good woman 
who had never allowed her art to interfere with 
the ])ringing forth of children, that wonderful 
artist who never ceased to think of home, who had 
looked upon the coming of each child as a blessed 
privilege to her, was singing each time to nine 
people. She was singing her message to the little 
one who had gone and to the eight darlings whom 






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God had allowed her to keep. No matter 'what 
song it was, it was in truth a lullaby for nine 
children. 

Character always gives strength to action. The 
insincere poet may write beautifully, btit his i)oesy 
never reaches to the heart, for his heart is not back 
of it. There was something back of the songs of 
the diva, something ecjually as beautiful. It was 
the heart-felt appreciation of a mother for the little 
ones who had come to her. The charm of her 
voice was no greater than the charm of her mother- 
hood, loving and ever mindful of the privilege, 
^lotherhood, the most glorious thing in all the 
world, was back of every number on her program. 
While she sang, her heart reached otit, sometimes 
clear across the continent to the eight children 
whom she loved with all the sweet devotion that 
is possible, and she took each child to her heart 
and sang to it while we thought she was singing 
to us. 

Three times has this splendid woman taken the 
marital vows. She was ahvays as good a wife as 
she was a mother. But the father of her children 
always had the strongest love among her husbands, 
and when William Rapp, Ji*., of New York, says 
that he was her porter and her chiropodist as w^ell 
as her agent and manager, w^e cannot help but 
applaud the frugal foresight of the great artist. 






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who always took time to bring another child into 
the world if the Fates so decreed. She knew the 
ability and the limitations of William Rapp, Jr., 
no doubt, and when we remember how this woman 
has for so many years been adored by the music 
loving world and that William Rapp, Jr.. now says 
that he has been responsible for her success, a 
hint, at least, comes to us of what may have 
prompted the domestic infelicity wdiich caused the 
mother of nine children to go to the divorce court 
and ask freedom from her union with her third 
husband. All the music loving world knows who 
Madame Schumann-Heink is — has known for 
many years. Not one per cent has ever heard of 
\\'illiam Rapp, Jr., except as the "husband of Mad- 
ame Schumann-Heink." She charges failure to 
])rovide and a violation of his marriage vows with 
a New York affinity. 

Amid all of her successes Madame Schumann- 
Heink has thought of home. Every day her heart 
has gone back to her children and she has known 
that longing to be with them and to observe those 
motherly cares in which a woman like her has 
always found real delight. When Thanksgiving 
came, or Christmas, or Easter, or any other day 
of more than ordinary moment, the diva has had 
those children of hers brought to her, sometimes 
clear across the continent, and on those days they 

80 




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have had their glad reunion, the sweetest taste of 
''home." During- her weeks of hberty from the 
stage she has been with them constantly and she 

><P has found no finer delight than the role of mother- 

hood, of housekeeper. When she retires from the 
stage, and we hope it will be many, many years \\^ 

away, she will reign then in the sweetest of her 
roles. She will sit by her own hearthstone and 

;\v\l have her children with her. ^Madame Schumann- 

Heink has done more than charm great audiences. 
She has i)roven how queenlv she is as a mother. 

Jim Jam Jems. March. 1914. ^ 



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FA OND the cloud with its shadow is 
the star with its Hght." How httle 
sympathy, indeed, this old world 
holds! There is humanity in all of 
us, no doubt, and yet in this age of the "survival 
of the fittest," the love of Mammon, the greed for 
Gold, the passion for success, for i)osition, for 
influence and independence drive humanity for- 
ward at a mighty pace, and few of us have time to 
note the misfortune of a fellow being, the misery, 
the loneliness, the loss of Hope and all that life 
holds dear. We see only the seething, surging 
mass, striving for Success, and we seldom cast 
even a passing- glance at the unfortunate pilgrim 
by the roadside as we hurry on with life's throng. 
These thoughts come to us tonight because of 
a picture of a lonely, helpless old man — just a bit 
of human wreckage along life's wayside — crudely 
depicted by a hurried newspaper reporter in the 
following item : 

"Adjudged insane, Daniel Clayton, aged 106 years, 
was brought to the county jail from Oliver County, 
North Dakota, Saturday night, and will be taken 
to the insane asylum at Jamestown by the State 
Transportation Agent tomorrow. The case is one 
of the most pitiful brought before the county officials 
for some time. The man is in a feeble condition be- 

82" 




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cause of advanced age and is unable to care for hini- 
The commitment papers show that Clayton is 
the father of 10 children, the voungest being" now of 
age." 

The busy newspaper reader hurries by an item 
like the above without giving it a second thought. 
He looks upon it as but one of the tragedies of a 
day chronicled by the daily press. The fearful 
slaughter of humanity in Europe's carnage of 
blood in the past two years seems to have deadened 
the human sense. We hurrv over the headlines 
telling of several thousand killed in this or that 
battle, or the terrific toll of life in the gaining of a 
few yards on this or that front. We read the 
account of the torpedoing of a transport that car- 
ried a thousand souls into eternity. Incidents of 
this kind are so common that few people take time 
to read the details. The headlines are sufficient. 

What wonder, then, that the simple story of this 
old man being carted off to an insane asylum 
received but passing notice! And yet, the trag- 
edy of this one human life appealed to us to the 
extent that we made inquiry to ascertain the facts, 
and we found them just about as recorded by the 
reporter in the colorless little item quoted above. 

The story has haunted us — fascinated us. We 
can not shake off the spell of hopelessness that 
comes with the^thought of this lonely, feeble, tired 

83 



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old man, buried there in the cell of an insane 
asylum. It is just a feeble hope that we may cause 
someone to pause for a second and shed a tear of 
sympathy for the forsaken, forlorn, hopeless old 
outcast, that prompts us to comment. And who 
, knows but what the lesson it teaches may save 
some other wreck of humanity from a like fate? 

In looking" over the century or more that has 
spanned the life of Daniel Clayton, one can not 
but be impressed with the panorama that it un- 
folds. We have naught to guide us in tracing the 
years of Clayton's life, except the date of his birth 
— 1810 — and the date of his legal death by the 
incarceration in the asylum — 1916. We have only 
the birth and the period of the grave. Who can 
fill the interim? Who can speak of the hopes and 
fears, the joys and sorrows of that century of 
human life? Who can solve the mystery of his 
quiet hours, of his years of strug-gle, of his ambi- 
tions? 

Sometimes, when we look over the circumstances 
of human life, almost a curse rises to the lips. 
When we see the ambitions of man defeated; when 
we see him struggling with mind and body in the 
only legitimate prayer he can make to accomplish 
some end : when we see his aim and purpose frus- 
trated by a fortuitous combination of circum- 
stances over which he has no control : when we see 




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the outstretched hand, about to grasp the flag of 
f^xj victory, take instead the emblem of defeat, we ask, 
!i "What is Life? Dreams, Awakening and Death! 

! A pendulum 'twixt a smile and a tear. A momen- 

I tary halt with the waste, and then the nothing we 

set out from. 

Daniel Clayton, after living throughout the 
world's greatest century of progress; after witness- 
ing the building of vast empires, the welding in 
^ ^* blood of the American nation, the wondrous — 

almost unbelievable — advance in science, in struc- 
tural and mechanical genius; after living through- 
out a century of continuous opportunity, of light 
and advancement, comes at last to end his days in 
an insane asylum, alone, penniless, a weary body 
and a weakened jnind— the mind of a child that 
gropes falteringly back over the long stretch of 
years in a vain effort to locate the loving touch 
of the hand of kin, a vain longing for the caress 
of a loved one — his own flesh and blood. For- 
saken, forgotten, discarded! A pitiable wreck 
along life's wayside! 

Here, in the great state of North Dakota, where 
peace and plenty abound, where love and truth and 
honor and every sentiment that blooms in the heart 
of true manhood and womanhood is woven into the 
glad freedom of the West; here, where the meas- 
ure of a man is taken from his worth as a citizen. 





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a neighbor, a friend, and not from gold or lands 
or bonds — here, where humanity reaches its high- 
est goal of happiness, Daniel Clayton, finds the 
end of life's trail — and not a sigh or a tear marks 
the end. 

As the withered hand of the old patriarch shades 
the almost sightless eyes, and the tired brain tries 
vainly to view the eternal landscape of the past, 
Daniel Clayton hungers for the touch of the hand 
of love and sympathy. But the father of nine- 
teen children with their kith and kin, will go back 
to the nothing he set out from, his last caress be- 
ing from the Angel of Death as she flutters above 
his withered body. 

Is it any wonder that man so frequently asks 
himself, "Is life worth living?" 

Jim Jam Jems, November, igi6. 




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IJouth anb %oxit 

HE month of June just passed was the month 
of brides — the mating time of youth and 
love. After all life would not be worth the 
living were it not for youth and love; yet 
youth will fade and the fires of love will die within 
the breast; "the world is strewn with broken altars 
and ruined fanes;" old age must come with its 
memories. \\^ can not call back yesterday nor 
bid time return; youth today — old age tomorrow, 
as we travel with light footsteps toward the nebu- 
lous star that gleams across the silent river. 

"The rose is fairest when 'tis budding new." 
And after all, all things are artificial, for "Nature 
is but the art of God." But how real life must 
seem to the young man and the young woman who 
joined their hearts and hands in Junetime — lovers 
filled with a sentiment as sweet and pure as 
morning dew distilled on flowers. For them, life 
-is just beginning; the years that have passed are 
but a memory, while the bright future stretches 
before their eyes in a mist of happiness; for their 
hearts are filled with the melody of love and the 
stern realities of the future are obscured by the 
honeymoon. Oh, how good it is to live in the world 
of youth and love! 

Tonight the leaves of memorv make a mournful 




87 




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rustling' in the dark; we are a boy again, traversing 
the sunht paths of youth in Junetinie. We see 
ourself, a freckle-faced, snub-nosed lad, as hand in 
hand we trudged o'er the hills with "Sunbonnet 
Sue" — our first sweetheart — and we recall for the 
instant those vows of undying love, and the future 
we planned together. On memory's fleet foot 
we chase o'er the years from Sunbonnet Sue to the 
schoolteacher, the stenographer, the city girl who 
came to the town to visit, and lastly to the village 
belle. We were some muggins in those days — 
sort of a country-town Beau Brummel; we were 
invariably changing the lock of hair in the back 
of our Waterbury — one day a blonde curl and the 
next day a silken tress of brown — as we switched 
our affections from school-girl to school-marm, 
spending our idle moments in writing sentimental 
ditties and taking things for our breath. 

The happy years flew by on noiseless wings, until 
all too suddenly came that turn in fortune's wdieel 
which in a single day drew the line between boy- 
liood and manhood — the happy carefree boy van- 
ishes like a dream, and in his place we find the 
man with responsibilities. In the hand-to-hand 
conflict with the world we haven't any particular 
regrets. We have followed the Siren of Fortune — 
followed feverishly while she beckoned, for the 
heart of youth is strong and the bright star of hope 

88 



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ever burns above the unrisen 'morrow. The years 
have sped all too swiftly, and as our faithful sweet- 
heart — Time — counts the gray hairs above our 
temples, we realize that we have been in love with 
Life all these years; the girls of our youth are 
forgotten: the locks of hair have been mislaid; 
some other fellow has led Sunbonnet Sue and the 
Httle village belle to Hymen's altar and repeated in 
dead earnest those vows we whispered so long- ago. 

Yes, "the leaves of memory make a mournful 
rustling in the dark." Just like every other old 
bachelor who has let Junetime after Junetime slip 
by unheeded while he camped on the trail of the 
Almighty Dollar, we have missed something; after 
all, the bachelor is simply a victim of circumstances 
which he might have controlled — but did not. 

Ah, young man — and you, too, young woman — 
you who have just taken that vow to love, honor 
and protect — to love, honor and obey — it is upon 
you that the future world depends. Be lovers al- 
ways! Let the honeymoon wane only "when death 
doth us part". 

What the world needs is more homes and fewer 
hovels. All honor to the girl who would rather 
have the love of an honest husband than the admir- 
ation of the whole he-world — the girl who would 
soil the beauty of her hands in dishwater while 
rearing children of love, rather than to live in a 

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world of luxury as a loveless wife, the toy of some 
geek with wealth. Society has set a price on beauty 
of face and rounded figure, but the girl who keeps 
her purity and sells it for real love to the ideal of 
her heart, commands the price tliat purity should 
./'bring and one that will not tarnish wdien the blush 
y\oi youth fades — but will live so long as there is 



honor among men. 



Jim Jam Jems, July, igi2. 




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plother, gome anb 

^t^ NDER a Cincinnati, Ohio, date line we read 

Jtl that, "Mrs. Mary McNamara, mother of 

Ai\ John J. and James McNamara, convicted 

dynamiters, is very ill at her home." Rev. 

John Hickey, the family pastor, says: "She may 

improve, but I doubt it. Her spirit is crushed ; the 

shock of the boys' confession has broken her heart 

and T will be surprised, indeed, if she lives very 

long." 

As we read these lines in the press dispatches 
for the day, we could not help drawing a mental 
picture of that old mother and her grief in this 
glad holiday season. And somehow, throughout 
the day, we have recalled again and again, this 
heart-broken mother and her despair. If this 
simple news item touched the heart of every reader 
as it did our own, then indeed the sympathy of 
many hearts goes out to her. 

We thought tonight to write of the joy of living 
— to write of sunshine, of flowers, of birds, of 
love and happiness — but we can not shake off the 
spell : the picture of that tired spirit, the torn heart, 
the lost hope of that old mother comes back to us 
and will not fade. 

What a mockery life is, after all! And vet. 




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what a tragedy! Think what this Hfe holds for 
the mother of John J. and James McNamara! 

The shock of the crime which the McNamara 
hoys committed has been softened by time; the 
dynamiting- of the Los Angeles Times building, 
which sent twenty souls into eternity without warn- 
ing and left dozens of widows, fatherless children 
and broken homes, was indeed the "crime of the 
century," and yet the tragedy in the heart of this 
old mother — the mother of these murderers — is 
greater a thousand fold than that which followed 
for the widows and children of the victims of tlie 
Times' disaster. 

One of the more progressive of the yellow jour- 
nals of the day succeeded some time ago in secur- 
ing a picture of Mrs. McNamara, the mother of 
the murdering dynamiters; this picture was pub- 
lished to the world with the usual sensational com- 
ment. To our dying day we will carry the picture 
of that face in our heart. The McNamara boys 
had an old-fashioned mother, who taught them in 
her homely way, the simple beauties of truth as 
she believed them regarding the old-fashioned 
Heaven. We read all this in the picture of that 
sweet and kindlv face. 

And now these boys — her boys — have passed 
beyond the pale and influence of that blessed trin- 
ity of their youth — "Mother, Home and Heaven." 
Thev have shattered the mother's faith and broken 




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92 







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her spirit; they have looked upon the old home for 
the last time, and the wicket gate along- the path- 
way to that old-fashioned Heaven toward which 
she guided their boyhood feet, has closed forever. 
All, all is lost. 

Surely, God, in his infinite mercy, will cause the 
great heart of humanity to throb for an instant in 
sympathy with this mother, and cause the pendu- 
lum of life to swing for the moment from a smile 
to a tear, while He places His protecting arms 
about the sinking spirit and offers the solace that 
He alone can give. 

May tlie cold hand of death hasten its touch 
upon the furrowed brow, and may the sweet sleep 
of eternity kiss the tired eyelids and rest the bur- 
dened heart. 

Better death a thousand times than that this old 
mother should live to watch the cowardly carcasses 
of her boys decay in the felon's dungeon. For 
John J. and James McNamara are cowards — crin- 
ging cowards of the first stripe. Had they been 
convicted and paid the penalty of their awful 
crime upon the gallows, that old mother would have 
still had faith — she would have gone to her grave 
with faith in her God and the belief that her boys 
were innocent. But by their confession of guilt 
they have indeed broken the mother's heart, 
shattered every home-tie and forever lost the light 
of Heaven. 




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Jim Jtiiii Jons. 
93 



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ME. EMMA CALVE, the human song- 
bird who has been heard around the 
world, is mournino- todav. She sits bv a 
grave and grieves alone. Among the 
millions who have been charmed by her voice and( 
superb acting there is little sympathy, for they do^ 
not know and understand. She weeps alone. It 
is not the grave of a loved one. Nor is it the 
grave of mother, or husband or brother or sister. 
It is not this kind of a loss that has bowed her 
down. But she sits in the sunset, while tears such 
as angels weep burst forth in her heart's yearning 
as she looks down upon the grave of her past. 
She had her supreme chance of happiness, maybe, 
but she passed it by. It is gone forever. She is 
the childless woman of forty-five who looks back 
upon what she has missed. She has gathered 
riches — yet finds herself poorer than the poor 
woman who sat in the gallery and wept while she 
sang. For such is the law of compensation. 
Mme. Calve mourns because she has no child. 
She weeps because no lullaby has ever sprung nat- 
urally from her lips while a little downy head pil- 
lowed itself upon the beautiful breast and the 
matchless voice found the sweetest expression that 

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voice can know — the lullaby of a mother to her 
cooing- babe. 

We don't know the whys and the wherefores. 
We never talked to Mme. Calve and do not know 
whether the fact that she is childless is due to her 
resort to "science," or that nature has barred her 
from knowing what it is to have a child. Mme. 
Schumann-Heink has had nine children, eight of 
whom are now living, and the old sweetness^^the 
old charm of voice and person — is still there. For 
there is a dignity to motherhood that none other 
can realize. 

But Emma Calve, married and with every mate- 
rial reason to be happy, recently wrote to her native 
France, and unburdened her heart to a dear friend 
who gave the story to the press. "Fame is not 
happiness," said the greatest Carmen that the opera 
has ever known. "I would have preferred to be 
the mother of five or six children. They would 
have been my lullaby." It is the heart bowed down 
— a yearning that can never be appeased. For 
the time has passed for Emma Calve to know the 
divine happiness of motherhood. Thus does the 
woman who was born in '66 taste for the first time 
the bitterness that is found in the dregs of a life 
that has been filled with ease and adulation. She 
realizes that in the chase for the almighty dollar — 
and we all love it for the good it will do as well as 

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the pleasure it will bring — she has- turned away 
from the sunlit paths where little children clutter 
aroinid and give love and fidelity through the years, 
give comfort and happiness when the winter of 
life comes. 

Emma Calve is looking today toward the sun- 
set. The sunrise came in the long ago. The mid- 
day beams saw^ her in her great triumph — the 
matchless diva whose beautiful voice brought flow- 
ers and wealth and men and what she then thought 
to be everything worth while in life, to be cast at 
her feet. She is still an idol of the footlights, and 
her voice is more tenderly sweet than ever — per- 
haps, with the note of tender yearning in it. But 
Emma Calve would give her immense wealth and 
all the luxury that is hers to feel the chubby arms 
of her baby 'round her neck — the soft cheek 
pressed to hers. She has missed something, the 
dearest thing of life — the greatest joy that woman- 
hood realizes. 

Emma Calve sang last night to an atidience of 
thousands. She sang her way into the heart of 
every hearer with that sweet divine voice. She 
responded time and time again to the curtain calls 
and while she bowed and smiled, many a young girl 
and many a yoimg mother envied her. They 
would have given anything in the world to be able 
lo swav an audience like that. But thev did not 



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know. The manager congratulated her upon the 
artistic, and incidentally the financial, success of 
the evening. Then she went to the exclusive hotel, 
and the people stood aside with deepest respect 
while she made her way to the elevator. vShe went 
to her room, the maid came, and Madame prepared 
to retire. As the maid was dismissed, the great 
singer turned to a picture on the wall — a cheap 
})rint of a Madonna. She looked upon the mother 
and her babe. She turned away. There was a 
picture of Baby Stuart on another wall. She 
looked at this picture a long while. Then the tears 
gathered in her eyes. and rolled down her cheeks. 
For it was in the solitude of her room and in the 
dim still watches of the night that her arms hun- 
gered for the little form which could so naturally 
lie there. After all, she had realized that the 
childless life is the empty life, and none can realize 
it so well as the woman of forty-five. 

Emma Calve has paid the price. She has bought, 
with the children that might have come, her many 
hours and days and years of uninterrupted pleas- 
ure and leisure. 

Jim Jam Jons, February. IQ13. 




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^^■T' H\\ Big Thrill has come for Richard Hard- 
■ J ii^g' Davis. He faced death a thousalid 
^^^ times in the Spanish-American, Russo-Jap- 
anese, Boer and great European wars and 
V gasped his last while dictating over the telephone( 
y his ideas on national preparedness. There is deep^ 
sorrow in the hills where Davis roamed, back 
fifteen miles from Mt. Kisco, in New York state, 
for he was indeed a child of the forest. In his 
little country home he lived with his wife, Bessie 
McCoy, a former actress, who was known up and 
down the Great Soiled Way — a favorite of the 
stage and the cafes. 

A big love was theirs and those who say that 
one touch of the stage spoils a woman for mother- 
hood and wifehood should stop and consider the 
case of Dickey Davis and Bessie ^.McCoy — the 
"Yama-Yama" girl. 

Richard Harding Davis was a silk stocking Jour- 
nalist, if you please. He was born with a golden 
spoon in his mouth. He had the advantage of 
several expensive colleges. His parents w^ere soci- 
ally prominent and his father owned a big Phila- 
delphia newspaper — quite an asset to one whose 
intellectual trend is journalistic. 

There are those who hated him — puny little 

98 



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pigmies of Bohemia who never get anything print- 
ed, and yet like to attack Davis with the charge 
that he had everytliing on his side. A man may 
be a king — and yet not be able to wTite. It is a 
heaven-sent gift. Davis had it to a superlative 
degree. 

Alone in her little countrv home with her babv 
girl. Hope — named after the heroine of "Soldiers 
of Fortune," the book Davis liked best of all his 
works — Bessie McCoy sobs for her god-man. 
AMien he came into her life, filled as it was with 
wine dinners, millionaire young bloods, and crusty 
old stage hangers-on, she quit Broalway, turned 
her back to the most brilliant street in the world, 
and went to the beautiful Mt. Kisco hills to love 
her ideal, to bear him children, and forever to 
forget there was such a place as Broadway, where 
there is a broken heart for every incandescent. 

Davis loved the great outdoors. Somehow the 
wistful, frail young girl who sang for the ribald 
crowds every night appealed to him. He wanted 
her. Fifth Avenue was shocked when he married 
her — they expected him to marry some snivelling 
ping-pong enthusiast from "our set." But he didn't 
— he picked out a footlight favorite and let all the 
doting mothers go hang with their arched eye- 
brows and supercilious satires. 

Then he carried her away into the hills, built a 

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quaint old home among the trees and the Uttle god 
of love and happiness and contentment became lord 
of their two Hves. 

It was here that Davis lived with his wife — who 
never saw the Great White Way after she married 
him. Those who saw Bessie McCoy in shimmering 
stage costumes, would never know her, as, dressed 
in hunting boots, short skirt, sweater and felt hat, 
she tramped the hills with her husband. Bessie 
McCov had learned to live. 

Even during her husband's absence in France 
and later in Salonika, she never came back to 
New York. Her life had begun anew. She was 
reborn. Our heart goes out to this wife and mother 
in her hour of great grief. But somehow we 
fancy that the spirit of Dick Davis hovers over 
Bessie McCoy-that-was, and her precious little 
charge. 

How grand it is that he left her ai mother! 
Time will heal the wound somewhat — and she has 
her child — the child who sprang from the loins of 
the big, lovable and strapping adventurer. 

Richard Harding Davis will live long in the 
hearts of thousands of readers. He was a sinewy, 
steel-built American, and his loss is a heavy one. 
One of his great attractions was his superb phys- 
ique, which with his buoyant, adventurous spirit, 
carried him through so many journeys and over so 

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many battlefields, where he absorbed at first hand 
the extraordinary vigor and life he put into his 
writing. 

Dick Davis was a silk stocking journalist — if 
you will — but he was a man clean through. He 
liked the aristocrat, but he liked him for his better 
qualities — his simple cheeriness, strength, suscepti- 
bility to romance and his readiness to help a fellow. 
A great void in American letters has been made 
" by his passing on. .We say "passing on", for w^e 
know he is not dead. He has gone to bigger and 
better things. Just as he penetrated the soul of 
the tropics with his power of understanding, we 
feel he has penetrated what we choose to call the 
Great Bevond. 

At sea and' on land, under the blaze of the 
Southern Cross, or amid the fogs of London, Davis 
was equally at home; and he knew men. His 
heroes were men — men of strong souls and loyal 
hearts, whom it is good to know\ 

And Richard Harding Davis, rest to his soul, 
was bigger than any of his heroes. 

Jim Jam Jems, May, 1916. 





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**®h^ ®ie that ^Inbe^^ 

AUNTERING down the street t'other 
evening with a friend, we drifted into the 
httle picture showhouse. The place was 
packed and jammed and the very air 
seemed to be surcharged with excitement, 
usher finally found us a seat near the front, just 
as a man stepped before the curtain and announced 
that, "This is the closing night of the baby-show, 
and we knew then what had occasioned the unus- 
ual interest. We had never attended a baby-show 
before and at once our curiosity was aroused. 
The man explained that there were many new 
entries in the contest, and the audience was to act 
as judge. The pictures of the numerous babies 
entered were to be thrown upon the canvas and the 
three prizes would be awarded according to the 
volume of applause accorded each baby. 

At first the idea of acting as a juror in a baby- 
show rather appealed to our sense of humor, for 
all babies up to this time looked alike to us and 
about the only difference w^e had ever been able 
to discover was in the lung capacity. Had the 
real article been on exhibition the chances are 
good we would have taken to the woods, but the 
idea of a life-size re])roduction on the canvas didn't 
cause us any particular nervousness, even though 

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every "kid" in the neighborhood might be entered. 

Nobody but a confirmed bachelor knows what a 
nerve-wracking thing a baby is. Those of us who 
liave held one for a minute know what a world of 
misgivings and damp forebodings cloud the mind 
until we are able to "get away from under." To 
be perfectly candid, we never had very much time 
for babies and always looked ui)on them as a neces- 
sity and a sort of tolerable inconvenience. But 
that baby show knocked all of our ideas on the sub- 
ject topsy-turvy, gave us a peep at the tragedy in 
a mother's heart, and the incident became so thor- 
oughly fixed in our memory that we just can't 
resist the temptation to record it here. 

As the image of the first baby was flashed upon 
the canvas, and was greeted by a scattering 
applause, the thought occurred to us that the 
audience had been "packed," the ballot-box 
"stuffed" and the jury "tampered with," and as 
one after another of the fat, chubby little fellows 
laughed, "cooed" or frowned at us from the can- 
vas and we noted the reception accorded each one. 
we were convinced that each candidate for honors 
had conducted a campaign through its parents and 
their friends and it w^as evident that the jury was 
influenced in more ways than one. For instance, 
the banker's baby with its ribbons and furbelows, 
received but a slight recognition until it was whis- 





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pered "O, that's So-and-so's baby!" Then, of 
course, when it became generally known that the 
picture shown was that of the offspring of a prom- 
inent citizen, the applause became terrific. The 
audience easily indicated to us not only the posi- 
tion in life each baby held, but also the standing 
of its parents in the community. 

Sitting across the aisle from us was a man we 
liad noticed about town for some time; he was a 
day laborer, one of that vast horde of workers 
who win bread by the sweat of their brow. Some- 
thing told us that the plain little woman at his side 
was his wife, and then with a start the truth 
dawned upon us — their baby was entered in this 
contest. W^e can see them now as they sat with 
eyes glued to the curtain before them; occasion- 
ally the father w'ould join in the applause as an 
especially winsome and smiling little mite was 
flashed upon the screen; but the mother sat \\\\\\ 
clasped hands, watching, waiting, praying — for 
she knew that soon, possibly the very next, a pic- 
ture of the dearest, sweetest little cherub in the 
world would be there — her baby — the one to w^hom 
she had already voted first prize. We fell to 
wondering just how this plain father and mother 
would act when the all-important moment arrived, 
and satisfied that we would be able to know their 
baby from the vigorous vote of applause the 

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youngster would receive at their hands, we watched 
and waited. We commenced to distinguish a dif- 
ference in babies for the first time in our hfe and 
once in a while we joined in the applause when a 
particularly pleasing picture was exposed. Finally 
a plain little face peered at us from the canvas; 
there was a faint applause for a second and then 
it died away entirely. Something made us turn 
and look at the father and mother across the aisle; 
we saw his rough hand close on hers, and one 
glance at the mother's face told us more plainly 
than words could ever have told — this was their 
baby. 

Wlien we look back to that moment now, we 
wonder why we didn't applaud as we had intended 
to ; but it seemed to us that applause at that moment 
would have been vulgar — almost sacrilegious. 
Perhaps there was not another soul in that entire 
audience except ourself who knew that this father 
and mother were there when the picture of their 
baby appeared, for not a sound escaped them. But 
the handclasp of husband and wife, the complete 
love and happiness shining from their eyes, and 
just the faintest twitching of the lips as the mother 
leaned forward in breathless adoration, brought 
back to us from the misty past the memory of one 
who sleeps "where the long drooping-willow 



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branches o'er" — Mother! Great God — is there 
anything quite so sweet as a mother's love? 

We did not stop to hear the names of the prize- 
winners, or to see the remainder of the show. We 
were i^lad to break awav from the crowd and 
escape unnoticed, for somehow a man feels like a 
fool when tears mount unbidden to the eye. The 
fellow who conceived the idea of a baby show is 
a damphool. The baby never w^as born that isn't 
entitled to first-prize — in the eyes of its mother, 
and she is the only person in the W'Orld who is 
qualified to judge. But after all that baby show 
did something for us. We understand now what 
the author meant when he referred to a babe as 
"The tie that binds." 

Jhv Jam Jems. Scptriiibcr. 7(^12. 



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^■■r HIS is a story of the seamy side. It is a tale 
I "I of the heart throbs of those who are pre- 
^^^ sumed to have no hearts. It is a descrip- 
tion of the impulses of one who took the 
low road instead of the high road and got lost in 
the bogs and fens, but who didn't forget what 
manhood was like when the test came. 

Tom O'Neill was a "character." His standards 
were not the standards of the leading citizens. 
His ideals were considerably mussed up most of 
the time. He occupied a niche in the social fabric 
of Ely, Nevada — a mining- towai. Tom had two 
things for certain. He had a dance hall and a 
woman. He thought about them both a great deal. 
He had a place for refreshment and for fun, a 
place where the freighter and the cow puncher 
would find forgetfulness that they might remember 
in after days. To insure the prosperity of Tom 
O'Neill's dance hall it was necessary to have plenty 
of bar maids, those thrifty girls who passed from 
table to table or from booth to booth and saw that 
every man was "jarring loose," was spending his 
money. And upon their work they scored a com- 
mission. It was no place for a tender and inex- 
perienced girl. For she would only be in the way. 
It required the "know how." And Tom O'Neill 

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was an impatient soul. He wanted no inexper- 
ienced girls around his joint. Not much! H'e. 
didn't want to take time to teach. Besides that, 
he knew that unless a girl was hardened to the 
work that she would often weep and be homesick, 
and tears make men quit buying drinks. It makes 
them think of home and loved ones. The tearful 
lassie didn't get very far in the Ely dance hall. 

The girls who peddled Tom O'Neill's drinks were 
like all the other dance hall girls. They were gen- 
erally birds of passage, flitting from one place to 
another. For in their newness was their niceness, 
in their moving w^as their money. Many a girl has 
been in a dance hall and worked hard, and yet 
was as chaste as Diana, and that girl could look any 
person in the face and never blush. But the aver- 
age run of the dance hall girls could discuss a sex 
problem with all the interest of a T^obert A\\ 
Chambers or a Gouvernor Morris. 

And as the girls passed on to some other place 
of extraction it was necessary that their places be 
filled. The Ely market was supplied by Salt Lake 
City, where many a post graduate course is taken. 
It was the habit of Tom O'Neill to send the trans- 
portation to the dance hall girls. Tom never 
thought much about the Mann law. Possibly he 
hadn't heard about it. But he sent the money — 
or maybe his woman did, and the girls came on. 






108 



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Then came an indictment. The government was 
on Tom's trail. 

He stood trial. AMth the astuteness of a poli- 
tician, Tom saw that all the precincts were going" 
against him. The real good men were happy. For 
Tom was a problem. They wanted him punished. 
He was just a dance hall man, anyway, and kept 
a woman. Why shouldn't he go over the road? 

The opposition gathered strength. It looked bad 
for Tom. Then Tom did something that a great 
many leading .citizens could not understand. Tom 
was fighting hard, but figuratively speaking, he 
said, "Get behind me, woman," and then he dick- 
ered for peace. He squared his shoulders and 
looked them in the face. 

"It's all right, boys. You've got the goods on 
me. There isn't any use to buck the game any 
further. Not a bit of it. But let me tell you, one 
and all, I alone am guilty. Don't blame the 
woman. Don't try to fasten anything on her. 
The worst thing she has ever done is to care for 
me. That's all. She didn't know I sent for these 
girls. She didn't know that I sent them money to 
come here with. What do you want to jump onto 
a woman for, anyway? Pick on a man. I am 
the one. I am guilty. Fix it up to suit your- 
selves. But leave the woman alone. She will have 
a hard enough time, anyway." 

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And they sentenced Tom O'Neill to fifteen 
months in Leavenworth and allowed the woman to 
go. In the darkest hour of his life there showed 
in Tom O'Neill the finest quartz of all. The vein 
glistened and proved rich with the finest gold. For 
Tom showed how to take one's medicine and never 
whimper. And the Pharisee stands by and won- 
ders. For Tom has done something" the Pharisee 
can not understand. 

Jim Jam Jems, April, 1914. 




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